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i 
THE 

PLEASURES 

OP 

CONTEMPLATION, 

BEING 

•3 desultory investigation of the Harmonies, Beauties, 
and Benefits of JV'aiitre ; 

INCLUDING A 

JUSTIFICATION OF THE WAYS OF GOD TO MAN, 

AND 

A GLIMPSE OF HIS SOVEREIGN BEAUTY. 

THE WHOLE 

Intended as a source of pleasurable information to the studious, 

comfort to the unfortunate, and consolatory evidence to the 

doubtful child of affliction, that God only afflicts hira 

to-day, in order to reward him to-morrow. 

Pleasure and Love command, their lectures teach ; 
With more than mortal eloquence they preach 
Ye Connoisseurs and Epicures come here ! 
*Tis Pleasure calls — lend an attentire ear. 
For he who humbly views the works of God i 
His sov'relg;n beauty, and his sor'reign good ; 
Who contemplates his benefits ai'ound — 
That man a Paradise on earth has found. 

Sr THE AUTHOR OF « THE PLEASURES OF DEATH ■' 

TO WHICH IS ADDED, SOME 

CAUSES OF 

POPULAR POVERTY, 

ARISING FROM THE ENRICHING NATURE OF 

INTEREST, RENTS, DUTIES, INHERITANCES, 

AND CHURCH ESTABLISH^rENTS. 
Investigated in their principles and consequences. 

BY DR. BLATCHLY, OF NEW YORK. 

The destruction of tlie poor is their poverty. — Solomon. 



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PHILADELPHIA. 
PUBLISHED BY EASTWICK & STACY. 

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PLEASURES OP CONTEMPLATION 



CHAPTER L 

Preliminary remarks on tht design of this work. 

Reader AH ! ! do be candid ! read this book 
Before you judge it from a partial look ; 
The tender author you should near distress ! 
He is your friend, that points to happiness. 

Four days ago, being in conversation with an old in- 
tiligent acquaintance, on the present pressure of the times, 
it being February 27, 1817; he asked me, if I read the 
following =^remarks of Voltaire on the disorders obser- 
vable in Creation. I answered in the affirmative. I also 



* "Who can without horror," says this sophistical philoso- 
pher, "consider the whole earth as the empire of destiuction." 
It abounds in wonders; it abounds also in victims; it is a vast 
field of carnage and contagion ! — Every species is without pity; 
pursued and torn to pieces, through the earth and air and wa- 
ter ! In man there is more wretchedness than in all other ani- 
mals put together. He smarts continually under two scourges, 
which other animals never feci ; anxiety and listlessness in ap- 
pitance, which make him weary of himself. — He loves life, and 
yet he knows that he must die. If he enjoys some transient 
good, for which he is thankful to heaven, he suffers various e- 
vils, and is at last devoured by worms. This knowledge is his fa- 
tal prerogative: other animals have it not. He feels it every 
moment rankling and corroding in his breast : yet he spends 
the transient moment of his existence, in diffusing the misery he 
suffers ; in cutting the throats of his fellow creatures for pay ; in 
cheating and being cheated ; in robbing and being robbed; in 
serving that he may command; and in repenting of all that he 
does. The bulk of mankind are nothing more than a croud of 
wretches, equally criminal and unfortunate ; and the globe con- 
tains rather carcases than men. I tremble upon a review of this 
dreadful picture, to find that it implies a complaint against Pro- 
vidence ; and 1 wish that I had never been born." 



4 

interrogated him thus, " and do you really believe, his 
remarks to be true ?" he answered he did generally. I 
then told him, that I had formerly been too much of his 
opinion ; which produced in me the most painful sen- 
sations and distressing doubts and, that this led me to exa- 
mine the subject seriously in my own mind, and that I 
would venture to assure him that in six weeks from that 
day, I would compose a simple unadorned and evea 
untranscribed performanc;e, which would constrain him 
to acknowledge that Voltaire, though one of the greatest 
of modern philosophers was incorrect in his complaint 
against Providence. This intelligent gentleman, who is 
also a professor of the christian Religion ; could not be- 
live it possible that 1 could accomplish my engagmcnt, 
as aforesaid. However, I trust he who ofttimes makes 
use of the weak things of this world to confound the 
things which are mighty, and the foolish things to con- 
found the wisdom of those who are wise in their own 
conceit,* that no man might glory in man, but that 
Christ might be all in all, to the Glory of God. I hope 
and trust he will in his infinite goodness, enable a poor 
frail child of misfortune, to prove to the perfect satisfac- 
tion of all candid readers ; whether sectarians or anti- sec- 
tarians, that God is by no means impeachable, for the 
numerous ills observable on this terraqueous globe, but 
on the contrary; that he is the most excellent of all ex- 
cellent beings, great in Goodness, and good in Great- 
nesri ; and does all things in his power=* for the happi- 
nesss and comfort of his rational offspring, consistent 
always with his own immutable attributes, and our neses- 



* " The gospel of Christ bears too hard upon the pleasures 
of mankind, and lays us under too severe restraints ?" 

•'Does it then rob us of any pleasures worthy the rational na- 
ture? It restrains us, indeed, but it only restrains us from things 
that would do us harm, and make us and our fellow creatures 
miserable. It admits of every rational, manly, benevolent, and 
humane pleasure. Nay, it allows every sensual enjoyment that 
is consisient with the real good, and true happiness, of the whole 
compound nature of man. It enjoins every thing that can do us 
good, and itprohibts every thing that will do us harm, under pe- 
nalties of the most alarming kind. Could a Being of infinite be- 
nevolence and perfection do better, or act otherwise consistently 
with those perfections ?'* 



sary free agency. Another circumstance I would men- 
tion, which stimulated me to commence without further 
prograstination, my simplefied justification, of the 
ways of Providence, viz. perusing this afternoon in 
the " Shamrogue" on account of the unexampled suffer- 
ings of the poor in Great Britain and Ireland, many 
of whom have absolutely died of starvation, I transcribed 
the subsequent paragraph verbatum therefrom, to wit : 

*'Extract from the Dublin Evening- Post, of Nov. 14th. 
1816. In Waterford there has been a public meeting, 
at which the Bishop of the diocess presided. The town 
of Larne, however, as above stated exceeded Waterford 
in munificence. Larne produced /2000, while Waterford 
is stated to have produced less then /1 00, indeed it must 
have been so. The uncharitable niggardliness of the 
Lawns'd chairman, operated as a baneful example, the 
right rev. bishops diocess is valued (in the kings books) 
at /6000 per annum, but is worth about /20,000, this man 
of God put opposite his name the sum of /lO." This in- 
tance of reprehensible niggardliness in the above Right 
Rev. Father in God, I intend shall not pass without at 
least a mild animadversion in the subsequent investiga- 
tion. I shall demonstrate, that such man as the above, 
as well, as their abettors, supporters and defenders, are 
the primary cause of the many disorders and miseries of 
humanity, and not the great Jehovah. Yes, I shall prove 
that, ^^they who allozv oppression share the cri?}ie^^ 2ind if 
they are miserable it is only a just and equitable re-ac- 
tion of a kind and gracious providence, for their base 
and abominable servility, or as they call it loyalty I / / 
to man their worse enemy and ingratitude to God their 
best friend. No subject surely can be more interesting 
to perishing mortals, than the present one. And indeed 
I cannot find language to express the ardent desire I feel 
to do it justice, much less to clothe the thoughts which 
croud into my mind, in justification of the way of God to 
man, they beggar discription. 

** He av'm from all creatures hides the book of fate, 
All but the page presctibM fheir present state ; 
Fi'im bruM^s what men, fvom men what spirits know; 
Or who could suffer being here below ? 

A 2 



The Iamb thy riot dooms to bleed to-day, 

Had he thy reason, would he skip and play ? 

Pleas'd to the last, he crops the flow'ry food. 

And licks the hand just raised to shed his blood. 

Oh Windless to the future! kindly giv'n, 

That each may fill the circle mark*d by heav'n ; 

Who sees with equal eyes as God of all, 

A hero perish, or a sparrow fall ; 

Atoms or systems into ruin hurl'd. 

And now a babble barst, and now a world* 

Hope humbly then ; with trembling pinions soar 
Wait the great teacher Death ; and God adore. 
What future bliss he gives not thee to know. 
But gives that hope to be thy blessing now. 
Hope springs eternal in the human breast : 
Man never is, but always to be blest. 
The soul, uneasy, and confin'd from home. 
Rests and expatiates in a life to come. 

Lo, the poor Indian ! whose untutor'd mind 
Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind; 
His soul proud science never taught to stray 
Far as the Solar Walk, or Milky Way ; 
Yet simple nature to his hope has giv'n, 
Behind the cloud-topt hill, a humbler heav'n. 
Some safer world in depth of woods embrac'd, 
Some happier island in the wat*ry waste : 
Where slaves once more their native land behold, 
No fiends torment, no Christians thirst for gold. 
To BE, contents his natural desire ; 
He asks no angel's wing, no seraph's fire : 
But thinks admitted to that equal sky. 
His faithful dog shall bear him company. 

Go, wiser thou ! and in thy scale of sense. 
Weigh thy opinion against Providence j 
Call imperfection what thou fanciest such ; 
Say here he gives too little, there too much: 
In pride, in reas'ning pride, our error lies ; 
All quit their sphere, and rush into the skies. 
Pride still is aiming at the blest abode ; 
Men would be angels, angels would be gods. 
Aspiring to be gods, if angels fell. 
Aspiring to be angels, men rebel : 
And who but wishes to invert the laws 
Of ORDER, sins against th' eternal cause. 



CHAPTER II. 

Desultory strictnre& on the wonderful and benevolent ivorks 
of God, observable in the book of creation, contrasted 
with the cruel and malevolent works of man, and their 
just re-action, 

'•The spacious firmament on high, 
With all the blue etherial sky, 
And spangled heav'ns, a shining frame, 
Their great original proclaim : 
Th* unwaried sun froi/i day to day ; 
Does his Creator's pow'r display ; 
And publishes to ev*ry land. 
The work of an Almighty hand." 

I shall suggest but few remarks on the harmonies and 
beauties of nature, particularly observable in the plana- 
tory system, as I have dwelt largely thereon, in a number of 
my antecendent publications, and I wish as much as possible 
to avoid a sameness in my writings ; and, especially as I am 
more solicitous to exhibit a glimpse of the benefits, than the 
wonders of creation, in order to justify the ways of God 
to man, which is my primary object in this work. I 
also wish to particularize a few reasonable as well as 
philosophical arguments, to controvert the fallacious ob- 
jections of Voltaire against Providence, for my own con- 
solation, when I behold old age starving and innocence 
perishing for wat.t of the trimmings of the unfeeling rich 
booby's wardrobe, and the offals of the fraudulent epicu- 
rian's kitchen. I would likewise particularly wish to 
handle this most important subject, in such a manner, that 
it might be an eternal benefit to my ungrateful cotempo- 
raries. Herein I will endeavour to fulfil our adorable 
redeemers injunction " do good to them who dispite fully 
use you.^"* 

This animadversion I will endeavour to justify and 
elucidate in a subsequent chapter, wherein I hope to 
demonstrate that I neither solicit nor regard their praise, 
nor deprecate their censure. 

Every intelligent observer of nature will agree with 
me in this assertion, viz. that no individual npturalist, 
nor, indeed, all that is, or ever was in the world, could 



8^ 

delineate the harmonies, the beauties and benefits of one 
single species of medicinal plants. Who then can deli- 
neate the beauties and benefits of the millions of vegeta- 
bles, minerables, and fossils, spread profusely by the libe- 
ral hand of a kind Providence over the face of the whole 
earth. Who can examine the diameter, as well as the 
circumference of this terraqueous globe and not be asto- 
nished ; yet as time is but a moment compared to eter- 
nity, so this earth is but a point compared to immensity. 
The sun which is the centre of our solar system, is 
900,000 times larger than our earth, according to the 
computation of Sir Isaac Newton. Yet that glorious lu- 
minary, with all his attendant planets and their satalites, 
are but a small part of the grand machinery of the uni- 
verse. How can a creature so feeble as man, and he the 
feeblest and frailest of his species, attempt to exhibit even 
a glimpse of architecture so infinite, so amazing, so 
profound. As I am dazzled while attempting to view 
the wonderful v/orks of the God of nature in magni- 
tude, I will commence my investigation by a minature 
(exhibition of a small part of the dimunitive beauties and 
benefits of nature, and will look myself (and endeavour 
to stimulate my readers to do the same) with careful 
though desultory gradation, through nature, up to natures 
God. There are animalculas invisible, unless a micros- 
cope is used ? who show the infinite ingenuity of our 
Creator, as much as the planetary system. A drop of 
water contain fishes with fins as perfect in their nature as 
the whale, and insects with claws have been seen by the 
aid of a good microscope, on the body of a flea. Indeed 
it is my firm belief, and that belief is supported by ana- 
logy, that there are animalculas living in the tubes of 
plants, who exhibit the infinite ingenuity, as also, partici- 
pate the beneficence of the supreme architect of nature. 
We are as ignorant of the laws by which they are govern- 
ed and preserved, as we are of the laws by which the 
celestial spheres are governed. Many readers will no 
doubt consider the supposition of the existence of ani- 
malculas in the tubes of plants, and the antheroe of flow- 
ers as an absurdity. But, I would ask such cavillers 
which is the greatest phenomenon, the existence of thou- 
sands of animals with fins, in a single drop of water, 



which hare been counted by the celebrated natural phi- 
losopher Lcewenhock, or the existence of millions of 
animalculas in the tubes of each odoriferous flower. The 
fact is, all parts of nature contain animals, either in mi- 
nature or magnitude, capaple of participating the pleni- 
tude of the divine liberality. And does not the forma- 
tion of one diminitive animalcula with all the aparatus of 
animal life, such as the nerves, the arteries, the sinews, 
the veins, &c. &c. &c. display the infinite wisdom and 
goodness of God, as much as the formation of the enor- 
mous mammoth. Without any manner of doubt. How- 
ever, my design is not so much to demonstrate the infi- 
nite ingenuity manifested in the formation of insects or 
mamoths, men or angels, but, rather to show, that nature 
or rather the God of nature, has made no animal in vain, 
or without the view of rendering it as happy as the na- 
ture of its existence is capable of participating. Thus the 
animalculas find in a tulip a magnificent globe, a dew 
drop therein to them is a mighty ocean, the corolla there- 
of is to them the most luxuriant food of the colour of 
gold, like mountains of manna. They quaff nectar in 
abunbance, from rivers where the honey-bee can only 
gain a taste ? They can also see with their little spheri- 
cal eyes, a thousand harmonies, beauties, and benefits, 
which none but an angel could delineate, and even then 
no mortal would believe the delineation to be correct. 
We will allow that these ephemerous beings are but of 
short duration, a day with us is an age to them ; but re- 
member that day they are happy ^ and that is all I wish 
to prove. 

There is a regular gradation, inconceivable beauty and 
infinite beneficence observable between the smallest ani- 
malcula and the largest animal on earth. The different 
species and genera of insects, as well as animals, are 
certainly innumerable ; yet every one collectively, or in- 
dividually, whether local or itinerant are plentifully 
supplied by nature, with the aliament most suitable for 
them, and they are all as blessed as they can be. To 
every species of animal, from miniature to magnitude, 
there is a species of plant or insect, which serve them 
for food plentifully provided by nature. Here it will be 
objected by those who wish to find fault with Providence, 



10 

" why should the weaker animal be subject to the stronger, 
is it not cruel for the strong to devour and destroy the 
weaker, through earth, air, and water ? The spider de- 
stroys the fly, the woodpecker the spider, the vulture 
devours the woodpecker, &c. ? I answer thus. Nature 
is so prolific, that it is necessary to appropriate one part 
of animals for aliament to others. Were it not for this 
economy, the earth, air, and water, would swarm with 
animals like the locusts of Egypt, or the shools of her- 
ring in the north of Europe, and would finally produce 
stagnation in the waters, and contagion in the^air ; and 
thus destroy or disorganize that necessary equilibrium, 
by which the universe is supported. But where is the 
cruelty manifested in this order of nature. I would ask 
which is best for the insect, or the small fish, or the little 
bird, to live and feel the decripitude of old age, and then 
die a lingering painful death, or to enjoy its day of hap- 
piness, in the vigour of life, and then die instantaneously 
without pain ? which is generally, if not always the case, 
with animals which are devoured by the larger species. 
Man is the only animal that tortures man, as well as the 
brute creation. The cat may indeed play with the mouse, 
but will not torture it. The interrogation is simple, the 
answer must be obvious, and the wise complaining phi- 
losopher is silenced by common sense. The brightest and 
best of naturalists could not give a correct view of the 
harmony existing between a single species of animal, and 
the species of plant provided by nature for its aliment ; 
how then can the weakest and frailest of men, who is not 
even the fragment of a naturalist, give a glimpse of the 
countless millions spread over the face of the earth. It 
is a noble employment for men of capacious and com- 
prehensive minds, to study Botany, Anatomy, Chemis- 
try, Philosophy, and Astronomy, if they do it from pure 
motives ; namely, to gain a glimpse of, and forthwith to 
adore with supreme gratitude and humility the celestial 
architect, and contemplate with admiration his sovereign 
beauty. But if their primary object is transitory, praise, 
or pecuniary gain,f " verily they have their reward." For 
my part, I find it commands all my reflecting powers to 
investigate the motions and mechanism of one insect. 
The musquetto in its insect state, while in the water, I 



11 

have viewed with admiration. It is truly worthy the at» 
tention and trouble of the intelligent enquirer after truth, 
to examine the most diminitive insect through a good 
magnifying lens, or solar microscope ; he would be forth- 
with constrained to acknowledge, that not only a man but 
a moth, is " fearfully and wonderfully made." I have 
read with interest Colles' description of the aston- 
ishing beauties and harmonies in the minute crea- 
tion. It would be an employment worthy a first rate 
natural philosopher, to establish in each city in the United 
States, not only oraries for the investigation of creation 
in magnitude, but also solar microscopes to view it in 
minature. For the information of those who are unac- 
quainted with the solar microscope, I would obse^rve, 
that it is placed in a room completely darkened ; the light 
of the sun, however, is transmitted in a horizontal direc- 
tion through a magnifying lens ; the appearance of the 
object to be magnified is forthwith thrown upon a white 
sheet. The reader is intreated for a moment to view 
with his intellectual eyes, insects which he has, no doubt, 
often with his bodily eyes beheld without any interest, 
and as little idea of the infinite ingenuity manifested in 
their formation. In most parts of America the musquetto 
is seen as a diminitive, but felt as a formidable insect. 

** The Musquetto, or gnat insect, in its middle state, 
between a maggot and a musquetto, may be found abun- 
dantly in rain water. It makes an astonishing appear- 
ance when magnified on the screene to the length of six 
or eight feet, when the bulk is magnified more than five 
hundred and seventy milliop times. The pulse may be 
visibly seen to beat, in the dark central part, which ap- 
pears to be two great veins, or blood vessels, as they 
sometimes separate, so that light may be seen between 
them. In the head, the muscles which move the jaws 
may frequently be seen working. The blood may also 
be observed moving in the transparent part contiguous 
to the dark central part, but no words can sufficiently 
describe it. 

" This creature after it passes the state of an insect 
gets wings, and becomes an inhabitant oPthe air; and 
what is most amazing, that although a minute ago it was 



12 

an inhabitant of the water, it would now be drowned if 
plunged therein. 

*' The Louse is an ugly insect well known, which upon 
the screen of the solar microscope appears four or five 
feet long : it is commonly bred on the head. People ge- 
nerally think that the louse found on the body is differ- 
ent from that got on the head ; but the microscope dis- 
covers no such diiference : and we may be certain, that 
when people are dirty, and do not shift their linen fre- 
quently, the lice, when they get there, will lay their nits 
and eggs, where they will breed rapidly, because the nou- 
rishment they get on the body, they prefer to what they 
get on the head. Its magnified appearance is five or six 
feet long/ the motion of its limbs, exceedingly rapid and 
nimble. 

" Mr. Baker, in his treatise on the microscope, vol. 
2, page 181, says, that in 8 weeks a louse may see 5000 
of its descendants. This was experienced by Mr. Lieu- 
wenhoek, who put two females into a black silk stocking 
which he wore both day and night ; by which he disco- 
vered the progression of the increase as before mention- 
ed. 

The flea is another well know little insect, covered all 
over with black, hard shelly plates, curiously joined and 
folded over one another, in such a manner as to comply 
with all the nimble motions and activity of the animal. 
The solar microscope shows it four or five feet long. The 
scales are curiously polished, and beset about the edges 
with long spikes ; it has six legs, four of which are join- 
ed on at the breast. When it leaps, it folds these legs 
short one within another ; so that exerting their spring 
all at the same instant, it is sufficiently elastic to carry 
the creature to an incredible distance. 

" Two things in this creature seem to deserve our 
consideration : to wit, their surprising agility, and their 
prodigious strength. It can leap above a hundred times 
its own length, as has been, and may be easily proved by 
experiment. What vigorous muscles ! how weak and i 
sluggish in proportion to its bulk is the horse, the camel,] 
or the elephant, if compared with this puny insect ! 

" Cheese mites, although scarcely visible to the naked! 
eye, are magnified apnarently as large as rats ; movingi 



13 

through lumps of chesse with surprising agility. ITicir b#» 
bodies are round and plump, and thinlybcset withlong 
hairs. 

*' In vinegar and sour paste, a number of animalcules 
may be seen, exactly resemble eels, and exceedingly live- 
ly in their motions. 

" As spiders cast their skins, and leave them in their 
web, and as there are skins very different in size to be 
found in cobwebs, it is very probable they cast their skins 
frequently : this enables us to procure the skin of their 
legs, which, when magnified, and measured on the 
screen are twenty feet in length, considerably thicker than a 
man's body, and are covered with bristles surprisingly 
large. 

'* Mr. Barker says, that the contexture of the web, and 
their manner of weaving it, are the discovery of the mi- 
croscope ; that the spider has five little teats, from whence 
a gummy liquor proceeds, which hardens in the air, and 
becomes a string or thread, strong enough to bear five or 
six times the weight of the spider's body. The threads 
are finer and coarser, according to the size of the spider, 
and what is very singular, they can wind up or take the 
thread again into their bodies, and raise themselves up 
when any thing disturbs them in their descent. 

*' There is a very great variety in the texture, forma- 
tion, and ornaments on the wings of insects : some are 
composed of thin films, supported by strong bony ribs, 
some of which are covered with short feathers like the 
tiles of a house, as in moths and butterflies: some arc 
stuck over with short bristlels : others have short wings, 
as the gray and white feather moth. Many are adorn- 
ed with rows of feather moth. Many are adorned with 
rows of feather along their ridges, and borders of fea- 
thers round the edge ; some hatii hairs, and others hooks, 
placed with great regularity and order. 

" Those conversant in microscopes, need not be in- 
formed, that the beautiful colours on the wings of moths 
and butterflies, are owmg to elegant minute feathers^ end- 
ing in quills, and placed with great exactness in orderly 
rov/s, as, when rubbed off, the holes they come from show. 

**It is generally believed, that an eel has no scales ; 
B 



14 

but if its slime be wiped clean away, and the skin be ex- 
amined with the microscope, it will be found covered with 
exceeding small scales, ranged in a very orderly ma 
uer, and I believe very few fish, unless they have shell; 
are without scales. 

"The farina of flowers, is that fine mealy powde 
which is found on the little pendant tops of almost ever 
flower : its colour is different in flowers of differeuw 
)tinds. It was formerly imagined to be a mere excre- 
mentitious and unnecessary part of the plant ; but the 
microscope has discovered, that all the minute grains of 
this powder, are regular, uniform, beautiful bodies, con- 
stantly of the same figure and size, in plants of the same 
species, but in different kinds of plants, are as different 
as the plants themselves. 

*' The seeds of plants provide an ample field for the 
employment of the microscope; the ancients imagined 
the capillary plants, and many other kinds, produced no 
«eed, and thftr mistake could never have been rectified 
by the naked eye ; but the microscope has shown, that 
the several pieces of fern, hartstongue, maidenhair, &c. 
are so far from being barren, that they are amazingly 
fruitful ; that the seed vessels are on the backs of the 
leaves, and that the dust which flies off when we meddle 
with them, is nothing but their minute seeds. These 
6eed vessels appear to the naked eye like a black or 
brown scurf on the back side of the leaf; but when view- 
ed by the microscope, they resemble little circular tubes 
divided into many cells, containing seeds. When the 
seed is ripe, the vessels fly open with a spring, and spirt 
the seed out on every side, in the form of dust ; and if 
at that season, some of the leaves are put in a paper cone, 
and that be held to the ear, the seed vessels may be heard 
to burst, with a considenible noise ; some of these minute 
vessels, contain at least one hundred seeds, invisible to 
the naked eye. 

*' The dust of the fungus pulverulentus, or pufF ball, 
seems to the naked eye like smoke or vapour ; but when 
magnified by one of the greatest magnifiers, (for else it 
cannot be distinguished), it appears to be an infinite num- 
ber of little globules, of an orange colour, somewhat trans- 



15 

parent, whose diameter is not more than the fifth part of 
that of a hair. 

. ! " The Weevil and Wolf are two kinds of insects which 
,40 abundance of mischief to all sorts of grain, by eating 
ato them, and devouring all their substance ; and as the 
>iccount of them may be some advantage to the farmer, 
A^e shall publish it at large. 

' " The' Weevil is somewhat bigger than a large louse, 
with two pretty, jointed, tufted horns, and a trunk, or 
piercer, with which it, gnaws its way into the heart of 
the grain, cither to seek for food, or deposit its eggs there. 

" By keeping these creatures in glass tubes, with some 
grains of wheat it will be found that the female perforates 
a. grain and therein deposits a single oblong egg, or two 
at most, (a grain of wheat being unable to maintain above 
one or two when hatched) and this she does to five or 
six grains every day, for several days together. These 
eggs not above the size of a grain of sand, in about sevea 
days produce an odd sort of a white maggot, which wrig- 
gles its body pretty much, but is scarcely able to move 
from place to place, as indeed it has no occasion, being 
happily lodged by its parents where it has food enough. 
This maggot turns into an aurelia, which in about four- 
teen days, comes out a perfect weevil. 

" Weevils when in the egg, or not come to their per , 
feet state, are often devoured by mites. 

** The wolf is a little white worm or maggot that in- 
fects granaries or corn chambers, and often does unspeak- 
able damage. 

"I call it a worm or maggot because under that form 
it does the mischief: though in its perfect state, it is really 
a small moth, whose wings are white, spotted with black. 

" This little maggot has six legs, and as it creeps along, 
there issues from its mouth an exceeding fine thread or 
web, by which it fastens itself to every thing it touches, 
so that it cannot fall. Its mouth is armed with a pair of 
reddish forceps, or biting instruments, with which it 
gnaws its way, not only into wheat or other grain, but 
perforates even wooden beams, boxes, books, and almost 
any thing it meets with. 

^ " Towards the end of summer, this pernicious insect 
(in corn chambers infested with them) may be seen crawl- 



16 

ing up the walls in great numbers, in search of proper 
places, where they may abide in safety during their con- 
tinuance in their aurelia state : for, when the time of un- 
dergoing a change into that state approaches, they forsake 
their food, and the little cells they had formed of hol- 
lowed grains of corn, clotted together, by means of the 
web coming from their mouths, and wander about till 
they find some wood beam, or other body to their mind, 
into which they gnaw holes with their sharp fangs, capa- 
ble of concealing them : and there enveloping themselves 
in a covering of their own spinning, soon become me- 
tamorphosed into dark coloured aurelias. 

" These aurelias continue all the winter inactive and 
harmless; but about April or May, as the weather grows 
warm, they are transformed anew, and come forth moths 
of the kind above described. They may then be seen in 
great numbers, taking little flights, or creeping along the 
walls ; and as they eat nothing in their fly state, are at 
that time not mischievous. But they soon couple and 
lay eggs, shaped like hen's eggs, but not larger than a 
grain of sand, each female sixty or seventy, which by 
means of a tube at the end of her tall, she thrusts or in- 
sinuates into the little wrinkles, hollows, or crevices of 
the corn ; where, in about sixteen days, they hatch, and 
then the plague begins ; for, the minute worms or mag- 
gots immediately perforate the grain they were hatched 
ed upon, eat out the very heart of it, and with their webs 
cement other grains thereto, which they likewise scoop 
out and devour, leaving nothing but husks and dust, and 
such a quantity of their dung, as show them to be more 
voracious insects than the weevil. 

" The watchful observer has two opportunities of des- 
troying these vermin, if they happen to be among his corn; 
one is, when they forsake their food and ascend the walls, 
which they will sometimes almost cover : the other, when 
they appear in the moth state : at both these times they 
may be crushed to death against the walls, by clapping 
sacks upon them. But they may be exterminated still 
more effectually, if, closing up all the doors and windows, 
the corn chamber be filled with the fumes of brimstone, 
by leaving it burning on a pan of charcoal, without giv- 
ing it any vent for twenty-four hours. Great ca.i'tion 



17 

however, must be used, to open the windows and doors, 
and let all the fumes be entirely g®ne, before any body 
enters the place afterwards, for fear of suffocation. The 
fumes of the sulpher are in no wise hurtful to the corn. 

" The eyes of insects are amazing^ pieces of mechanism, 
whose structure and disposition, without the assistance of 
the microscope, would forever have been unknown to 
man. 

^' Beetles ^ Dragon-flies, Bees, Wasps, Ants, common 
flies, butterflies, and many other insects have two cres- 
cents or immoveable caps, composing the greatest part 
of the head, and containing a prodigious number of little 
hemispheres, or round protuberances, placed with the ut- 
most regularity and exactness in lines crossing each other, 
and resembling lattic work. These are a collection of 
eyes, so perfectly smooth and polished, that like so many 
mirrors they reflect the images of all outward objects. 
One may see the figure of a candle multiplied apparently 
to an indefinite number on their surfacee, shifting its 
beams into each eye, according to the motion given it, or 
the particular position of the observers hands ; and as 
other creatures are obliged to turn their eyes to objects, 
this sort have some or other of their eyes always ready 
directed towards any objects which present themselves 
on any side. In short, all these little hemisphers are real 
eyes, having in the middle of each a minute lens and 
pupil, through which objects appear inverted, or topsy- 
turvy as through a convex glass : this becomes also a 
small telescope, when there is a just focal distance be- 
tween it and the lens of the microscope. It is also rea- 
sonable to suppose, that every lens has a distinct branch 
of the optic nerve ministering to it, and yet, that objects 
are not multiplied, or appear otherwise than single, any 
more than they do to us, who see not an object double, 
though we have two eyes. 

" Almost every man that has used a microscope has 
been entertained with a view of these minute eyes, and 
yet very few have well considered either the nature or 
number of them. Mr. Hook computed 14O0O hemis- 
pheres in the two eyes of a drone ; viz. 7O0O in each eye. 

Mr. Lieuwenhoek reckoned 6236 in a silk worm's two 
eyes, when in its fly state ; 3181 in each eye of a beetle, 

B 2 



18 

and 80OO in the two eyes of a common fiy. The Libelia* 
Adder- bolt or Draggon-fly, (called here the aeviPs darn- 
ing needle) is the most remarkable of all insects for its 
large pearled eyes : which even with a common reading 
glass appear like the skin we call shagreen. Mr. Lieu- 
wenhoek reckons in each ej/e of this creature 12544 linses, 
placed in a hexangular position, like a honey-comb, each 
having six others round it : which is also the order most 
common in other insects' eyes. He likewise observed 
in the centra of each lens, a minute, transparent spot, 
brighter than the rest, and supposed to be the pupil through 
which the rays of light are transmitted to to the retina : 
this spot has three circles surrounding it, and seemed se- 
veral times less than the diameter of the whole lens. We 
see here, in each lenticular surface, as much accuracy in 
the figure, elegance in the polish, and as much contri- 
vance and beauty as in the eye of a whale, or an elephant, 
How delicate, how exquisitely delicate,imust the filaments 
of the retina be which serve to each of these, since the 
ijrhole picture of objects painted thereon must be millions 
of times less than the image of them painted on the hu- 
man eye I 

" There can be no doubt, that lice, mites and multitudes 
of animalcules much smaller than these, have yet con- 
trived and fashioned, to discern objects some thousands 
of times less than themselves : for so the minute particles 
they feed on, and many other things necessary for them 
to distinguish and know perfectly, must certainly be. 
What a power then of magnifying are such eyes endued 
with ! and what extraordinary discoveries might be made, 
were it possible to obtain glasses through which we could 
see as they do ! 

** The common fly is adorned with beauties not to be 
conceived without a microscope. It is studded from 
head to tail with silver and black, and its body is all over 
beset with bristles pointing towards the tail. The head 
contains two large eyes, encircled with borders of silver 
hairs ; a wide mouth with a hairy trunk, or instrument to 
take in its food ; a pair of short horns, several stiff black 
bristles, and many other particulars discoverable by the 
microscope. The trunk consists of two parts folding 
over one another, and sheathed in the mouth : the extre- 



19 

mity thereof is sharp like a knife, for the separation or 
any thing : the two parts can also be formed occasionall}', 
into a pair of lips for taking up a proper quantity of food; 
and by the fly's sucking in the air they become a kind of 
pump to draw up the juices of fruits, or other liquors. 

" Some flies are much lighter coloured and more trans- 
parent than others ; and in such, the motion of the intes- 
tines may be seen very distinctly, working from the 
stomach downwards, and also the motion of the lungs, 
contracting and dilating themselves alternately. Upon 
opening a fly, numberless veins may likewise be discov- 
ered, dispersed over the surface of the intestines, for the 
veins being blackish and the intestines white, they are 
plainly visible by the microscope, though 200,000 times 
slenderer than the hair of a man's beard. According to 
Mr. Lieuwenhoek, the diameter of 450 such veins is 
about equal to the diameter of a single hair of his beard, 
and, consequently, 200,000 of them put together would 
be about the bigness of such a hair. 

" In most kind of flies the female is furnished with a 
moveable tube at the end of her tail, by extending which 
she can convey her eggs, or what are called fly-blows, 
into convenient holes and receptacles, either in flesh, or 
such other matters as may afford the young ones proper 
nourishment. From the eggs come forth minute w^orms, 
or maggots, which after feeding for a while, in a voracious 
manner, arriving at their full growth, become transform- 
ed into little brown aurellas, whence, after some time 
longer, they issue perfect flies. 

" It would be endless to enumerate the different sorts 
of flies, which may be continually met with in the mea- 
dows, woods, and gardens, and impossible to describe 
their various plumes and decorations, surpassing in beau- 
ty all the magnificence and luxury of dress in the courts 
of the greatest princes. Every curious oi;server will 
find them out himself, and with amazement and adora- 
tion lift up his eyes from the creature to the Creator ! 

" The Ant is an object well worth our notice, being a 
creature of very singular structure. The head is. large, 
and adorned with two pretty horns, each having twelve 
joints. Its eyes are protuberant and pearled ; it has jaws 
sawlike, or indented, with seven little teeth that exactly 



20 . 

tally, opening sideways, and able to gape very wide asun- 
der, by the help whereof it is often seen grasping and 
transporting bodies of three or four times it own bulk or 
weight. It is naturally divided into the head, the breast, 
and the belly, or tail, each of these parts joining to the 
other by a very slender ligament. From the breast part, 
three legs come forth on each side. The tail is armed 
with a sting, which the animal uses only when provoked ; 
but then a poisonous liquor is conveyed by it into the 
wound which occasions pain and swelling. The whole 
body is cased over with a sort of armour, so hard, as 
scarcely to be penetrable by a lancet, and thick set with 
shining whitish bristles. The legs, &c. are also covered 
with hairs, but much smaller, and of a darker colour. 

" Upon opening an ant-hill, we see them carrying in their 
mouths, and securing, with great solicitude, small whitish 
bodies, usually called their eggs : these, however, are not 
eggs, but ants in their aurelia state, each encompassed 
with an integument of its own spinning. We might have 
conjectured this from the largeness in proportion to a 
perfect ant ; but the microscope fully proves it by disco- 
vering to us their real eggs of an oblong figure, about 
the size of a grain of sand, ninety whereof would not ex- 
tend the length of an inch, nor 170 be equal in bigness to 
one of these aurelia inslosed in its case. These minute 
eggs produce maggots, which, after a time, spin them- 
selves coverings, become aurelias, and then ants. The 
parents' affection for their young, in their aurelia state^ 
is so strong, that, when danger threatens, they instantly 
run away with them, and will sooner die than leave 
them. There are several sorts of ants, differing both in 
size and colour; and towards the end of summer many 
of them are seen having four wings : these, Swammer- 
dam says, are males, which have been frequently seen to 
cast off or drop their wings. 

" The French academy has published a curious ac- 
count of ants, highly worthy of notice. Every ant's nest 
has a straight hole leading into, about the depth of half 
an inch, which afterwards runs sloping downwards to 
the public magazine, where the grains they collect are 
stored up : and this is a different place from that where 
they rest and eat. Their corn being kept under ground 



21 

would shoot and grow, did they not prevent it by biting 
out the germen, or bud, before they lay it up ; but this 
they constantly do, for if their corn be examined, no bud 
will be found therein, nor if sowed in the earth will it 
ever vegetate ; were it, however, to lie continually m the 
ground, the moisture would occasion it to swell and rot, 
and make it unfit for food ; but these inconveniences 
they find means to prevent, by their vigilance and labour, 
in the following manner : — They gather very small par- 
ticles of dry earth, which they bring out of their holes 
every sun-shiny day, nnd place them in the heat ; every 
one of them brings in her mouth a particle of this earth, 
lays it by the hole, and then goes to fetch another, so 
that, in a quarter of an hour, a vast number of such par- 
ticles of dried earth are heaped round the hole ; their 
corn is laid upon this earth when under ground, and co- 
vered with the same. When these particles of earth are 
brought out, they fetch out their corn likewise, and place 
it round this earth, making two heaps about the hole, one 
of dry particles of earth, and the other of grains of corn ; 
last of all, they fetch out the remainder of their dry earth, 
whereon the corn was laid. They never go about this 
work unless the weather be clear, and the sun very hot ; 
but when both are favourable, they perform it almost 
every day. 

" The author of this account had found a nest of ants 
in a box of earth standing out from a window two stories 
high, whence they made excursions both upwards to the 
top of the house, where some corn lay in a garret, and 
downwards into a garden which the window overlooked. 
The situation of this nest obliged them to go up or down 
a great way before they could possibly meet with any 
thing ; but he found, notwithstanding, that none of them 
ever returned empty, but every one brought a grain of 
wheat, rye, or oats, a small seed, or even a particle of dry 
earth, if nothing else could be got. Some travelled to 
the further end of the garden, and, with prodigious la- 
bour, brought heavy loads from thence. It required 
four hours, as he learned by frequent observation, to car- 
ry a pretty large grain or seed from the middle of the 
garden to the nest ; and he computed therefrom, that an 
ant works as hard as a man who should carry a loa4 



22 

twelve miles a daj% The pains these ants took to cany 
grains of corn up the wall, to the second story, climbing 
all the way with their heads downwards, must be exceed-^ 
ingly great : their weariness was shown by the frequer 
stops at the most convenient places, and some appear- 
so fatigued and spent that they could not reach th 
journey's end, in which case it was common to f 
the strongest ants, which had carried home their h 
come down again and help them. Sometimes they v 
so unfortunate as to fall down with their burden v 
just in sight of home ; but when this happened, they 
dom lost their corn, but carried it up again. He sa\ 
one of the smallest ants carrying a large grain of whea 
with incredible pains, when she and her load together 
tumbled back to the ground ; going down to look foi 
her, he found she had recovered the grain, and was ready 
to climb up again ; this misfortune befel her three times, 
but she never let go her hold, nor was discouraged, till 
at last, her strength failing, she was forced to stop, and 
another ant assisted her to carry home her load to the 
public stock. 

" How wonderful is the sagacity of these insects ! ho 
commendable their care, diligence, and labour ! he 
generous their assistance of one another for the service 
of the community ! how noble their public virtue, which 
is never neglected for the sake of private Interest ! in all 
these things, they deserve our notice and imitation. A j 
contemplative mind will naturally turn its thoughts from 
the condition and government of ant-hills, to that of na- 
tions, and reflect that superior beings may possibly con- 
sider human kind, and all their solicitudes and toils, pride, 
vanity, and ambition, with no more regard than we do 
the concerns of these little creatures. 

" It would be endless to attempt to enumerate the various 
astonishing, and entertaining objects which may be exhi- 
bited by the microscope : we have, therefore, selected an 
account of those which have been displayed, in order to 
refresh or direct the memory of those who have attended 
the exhibition, and thereby to assist them to contemplate 
how weak, bungling, ill-shaped, and rugged, the nicest 
works of art are, when compared with the beautiful sym- 
metry, accurate proportion^ elegance and harmony of 



|i|i|i|i|i|i|i i|i|i|i]l]i|Ui|' 



23 



form, together with the profusion of colouring, b: 

ed with the splendour of diamonds, rubies, am 

gold and silver, which are set forth on worms, bui 

'^d flowers ; and what, in our estimation, are th 

> productions of nature ; I say, when we re 

^e things, our pride must be humbled, and ^ 

^^.ompelled to acknowledge the superior wisdo] 
.' ^tad goodness of the beneficent creator and p 
tit: V 4 things. 

We are indebted to the microscope for the kn 

^ the distemper called the itch is occasioned b; 
*>ude of exqeedingly small animalcules, which i 
A\A under the cuticle, or scarf skin, of the humai 
lid, by their motion, produce the intolerable 
T^hich compels the infected person to scratch, w 
/Moving their eggs, spreads the disease on other 
-.he skin. 

" We may hence account for this distemper i 
very catching, since these animalcules, by simple 
^an easily pass from one person to another, ha 

Xy a swift motion, but clinging to every thi 
^xh, and crawling as well upon the surface of 1 

"dnderthe outward skin, and a few being once 
i»tey multiply apace by the eggs they lay. The i 
may also be propagat«d in a like manner, by she( 
els, handkerchiefs, or gioves, used by itchy peop 
"hese animalcules may easily be harboured in sue 
and will live out of the body two or three days. 

" The discovery of these animalcules likewis 
the reason why this distemper is never to be cure 
ternal medicines, but requires lixivial washes, 1 
ointments, made up with salts, sulphurs, vitriols 



2i 

Were we to give a particular description of even a 
few of the insects with which we are most familiar*, our 
little volume, which is circumscribed, would be concluded 
before we scarce commenced our investigation, and our 
time, which is likewise limited, would be ended before 
we even partially justified the ways of God to man. I 
would ask, where is the inhabitant of the air from the 
moth to the eagle, or of the sea from the shrimp to the 
whale, or of the earth from the mouse to the mammoth, 
that ever deviates from the laws of nature ? I answer, 
not one, man only excepted. Yet man is the lord of the 
creation, in him is united both beauty and intelligence. 
He only can view the harmonies between each species of 
plants and animals, and the utility of minerals and fos- 
sels ; he can with his lens see in a grain of sand a globe 
in miniature, and with his telescope behold millions of 
globes in magnitude, not observable to the naked eye, on 
the milky way ; he can measure the distances of the pla- 
nets from each other, and from the sun, the centre of the 
solar system ; he can calculate the exact period an 
eclipse will take place even an age before the time, and 
not miss a minute in his calculation. He only of all ani- 
mals can command fire, wind, and water to obey him, 
the wild beasts to fear him, the tame ones to serve him. 
The vegetable as well as animal creation is likewise sub- 
ject to his dominion ; he is sensible of these and innu- 
merable other advantage, and yet, of all animals, he is 
the most ungrateful to the Divine author of all his mer- 
cies ; he well knows that it is his duty to be kind to 
others as God is kind to him, yet of all monsters he is the 
most cruel ; he sees the harmonies, beauties, and bene- 
fits of this terrestrial globe, and enjoys the countless fa- 



* Even a brief history of the family, or republic of bees would 
take a volume to contain it. They, like the industrious ant. are 
systematical in their labour and architecture, and may be consi- 
dered, not only the most useful, but he most domestic of their 
specif s. I recollect myself to have seen a small hive, which they 
built in a corner of the cabin of a vessel in one of the rivers of 
Africa, 200 miles from the sea shore, and while she was sailing 
up the said river. This will appear a phenomenon ; but it is cer- 
tainly a fact, for I iras stung by one of them. 



25 

v»urs and blessings, resulting from the variation and con- 
trasts of the seasons, yet scarce ever bows with grateful 
acknowledgements to the benevolent Being who supports 
him and the earth on which he crawls, as it were, in the 
palm of his benevolent hand. Spring crowns him with 
flowers, summer with yellow sheaves, autumn with pair- 
ple fruit, and winter with ventulating storms and health- 
ful snow. The seas and lakes are stored with fish, the 
vallies with medicinal herbage, the woodlands with sponta- 
neous fruit, wine, oil, and honey for the aliment of man. 
I have seen the wine taken from the lofty palm tree, and 
drank it. I have eaten the palm oil with rice, as also 
the wild honey, and various wild fruits have I gathered, 
and participated in, in the forests of Africa, aland flowing 
with milk and honey, rendered so by the liberality of 
God, but metamorphosed to a dismal dungeon by the 
cruelty of man. This is a lamentable fact, and I know 
it. I am, no doubt, more desultory and inelegant in the 
composition of this performance than perhaps any of my 
otiier works. I have often, too often, attended too much to 
the jingle of words, have used a redundant phraseolog)% 
the flowers of rhetoric, the embellishment of fancy, 
when I wished to please as well as profit, and, of course, 
gain the praise of my readers, but calamity and the 
treachery of man has cured me of all such vain desires 
and fallacious motives. I now care no more for the 
praise of man, who will shortly, with myself, be the food 
of worms in the silent grave, than I do for the dust un- 
der my feet. My fundamental object in these strictures 
is to please, to honour, to glorify God, and be a benefit 
and consolation to his intelligent but unfortunate crea- 
tures, whom he has heavily afllicted from the most gen- 
erous and benevolent motives, namely, to cure them of 
their inordinate love of earthly objects, and to stimulate 
them to seek their happiness in contemplating his sove- 
reign beauty ; their certain relief in fleeing to his out- 
stretched arms of mercy ; and their never failing refuge 
in his own sacred bosom. O! how sad a sight, and how 
often to be seen is the fulsome adulation of authors the 
most sensible and sublime, offered at the shrine of royal- 
t5^ How often do we see the very first rate authors, the 
latchets of whose shoes I ani not worthy to stoop down 

C 



26 

and unloose, offering incense at the feet of the vilest and 
most villainous of men, because, forsooth, they were 
clothed with imperial robes, and seated upon a throne, 
to gain which they waded through the innocent blood of 
thousands of their fellow mortals. Beauty unchaste, and 
in disgrace is truly a sad sight ; but the sight of genius 
thus degraded is a thousand times more sad, more sor- 
rowful, more detestable. The author who tells the world 
plainly that he is a doctor of laws, by placing the letters 
L. L. D. opposite his name, in the title page of his book, 
or perhaps D. D. to shew he is doctor of divinity, or 
M. D. a doctor of medicine, or A. M. a master of arts. 
These literary and popular notifications demonstrates to 
every child of nature, that such an author, and with such 
authors the world is, and has been crowded, is not totally 
divested of what Pope calls **the never failing vice of 
fools;" I mean pride ! ! Such notifications, though cus- 
tomary, are certainly very unnatural. A man may be a 
professor of zology, botany, mineralogy, but he is surely 
not a possessor of common sense, if he will have a tale to 
his name. However, such authors, who thus plainly and 
publicly expose their vanity are certainly to be pitied for 
their weakness ; but the man of genius, who prostitutes 
his eminent talents to flatter royal villainy with a cring- 
ing servility, should be despised. Was I not writing for 
the consolation and comfort of the desperate child of mis- 
fortune, who sickens at the prospect this wicked world of 
mankind presents to his view, I would be necessitated to 
apologise for the present digression. But even this de- 
viation from the rules of composition will answer the sal- 
utary purpose of convincing him as it has done myself, 
that calamity is the most necessary antidote to cure 
even men of genius of their inordinate love of sublinary 
praise and consequent vanity. And this species of pride, 
although commended by most, and considered trivial by 
all, I contend is a most destructive evil. I will not ap- 
peal to reason or common sense to consolidate this as- 
sertion, but rather to the source of truth himself. He 
very judiciously accuses the Jewish priests with a crime 
too common among our Christian preachers, namely, 
making long prayers to be heard of men, and he adds 
this awful apostrophe, " Verily, they have thbir 



REWARD," namely, the praise of capricious, petulent, 
and inconstant man; A poor reward indeed. I do 
not, nur will not censure, much less apply the above apos- 
trophe to any individual author or individual sect. For 
though I could point out many fatal errors and deviations 
from the dictates of reason and common sense, nurtured 
and supported by religious and political parties individ- 
ually, I will only point out errors which is destructive to 
human happiness generally. Notwithstanding authors 
who offer fulsome adulation to royal villainy, right hon- 
ourable knavery, and right reverend imposition, however 
laborious, sublime, and super- eminent their works may 
be, do in fact, evt n by their servile dedications, apply 
the foregoing apostrophe to themselves. 1 can but pity 
such authors, (I will not add despise, though they merit 
the appellation) while I am astonished at their transcendant 
abilities. But wherefore am I not also a crouching ser- 
vile wretch, writing for fame to please man rather than 
God, and offering incense at the shrine of aristocracy 
with a cringing servility. My good genii I may thank 
and calamity. I love to call my heavenly comforter and 
instructor by the above appellation, as Socrates used 
to do upwards of 2000 years ago, because it reminds me 
that he does not confine his benevolent comfort and coun- 
sel to Christendom alone, as many professors of religion 
very improperly suppose. The truth is, 

His love extends to all the human race, 
As also couniless worlds in boundless space, 
And circles all in one benign embrace. 

This matter does not properly belong to this chapter, 
however, as utility, not method, is my object, and as the 
thoughts which strike my mind are true, and are very in- 
teresting, and very pleasing to me, I will put them down 
lest they slip my memory. 

The blessed spirit of truth is ready to enlighten, in- 
struct, and comfort every rational being from the frigid 
^o the torrid zone, who are willing to receive his counsel 
and none but them. He can not force them to sec 
and love the truth as free agents. He holds up the light. 



2S 

yet they may shut their eyes and basely insult their own 
understandings. It is an absurdity to suppose that God 
Gould, and even if he could, that he would force a free 
agent to see, to love, to obey his truth. When force 
BEGINS, FREE AGENCY ENDS. What truth cau be plainer 
than this, yet who believes it ? I will add, if we are not 
free agents, (as millions of religionists boldly and un- 
blushingly say) but animal machines, without liberty or 
will, we cannot be rewardable for any virtue, or punish- 
able for any vice. But it is necessary not only to see 
but to obey the truth. As the good spirit can and does 
hold up the light of truth before our intellectual eyes, but 
cannot see for us, so likewise, even if we do see the truth, 
we must obey it for ourselves, he cannot do it for us ; the 
thing is impossible. God has made my mouth, but he 
cannot eat for me; he has graciously formed my corporeal 
and intellectual eyes and cars, but he can neither hear, 
nor see for me ; he has blessed me with reason, but he 
cannot reason for me, if he did, the reasoning would be 
his own, not mine. He does exhibit the light of Divine 
truth before the intellectual eyes of every man that com- 
eth into the world, sage and savage, Pagan and Chris- 
tian, Turk and Jew, Rev. man and layman. And with 
this blessed and gracious exhibition he sends calamity, 
misery, misfortune, almost to compel us to seek our re- 
fuge and happiness in him. But how seldom does even 
calamity cause the silly sons of men to turn from their 
worst enemy, man, to their best friend, God ; to cease 
worshipping their kings and priests and begin to worship, 
and, at least, to endeavour to serve and please him, and 
gain his approbation. We will reason for a moment on 
this most important subject: For if my simple sponta- 
neous reasoning herein is true, there are millions of Theo- 
logical books written by authors who could read Greek 
and talk Latin, and who called themselves in their title 
pages. Rev. i, e. Reverend, D. D. i. e. Doctors of Divin- 
ity, are totally untrue. And I may add, that if I advance 
the truth herein, there are clergyman who receive more 
wages for preaching the opposite error in one year than 
would keep me and my horse for twenty years. My 
mind is crowded with thoughts on this subject ; how- 
ever, I must postpone them for the present, but first 



29 

must declare, that though many Christians, so calledi 
contend that it is impossible for any but believers in the 
Gospel to enter the kingdom of heaven, I have found 
more hospitality among the savages of Africa than I 
have among the greatest professors of religion in Europe 
or America, and that in the time of my greatest need. I 
would mention one instance : a certain adventure once 
put me in their power, and they knew me to be a slaver — 
my only food was the spontaneous fruit of the forests, 
unless what they supplied, yet they never let me want. 
They had not sufficient food for themselves, yet they di- 
vided it without my solicitation,* and gave me part 
without ever reproaching me. I cannot resist the incli- 
nation I feel for introducing an episode from " AVE- 
NIA," page 125, which will elucidate my experience in 
the above instance. I must confess, of all my works, 
composed or compiled, published by myself or the book- 
sellers, I feel the greatest prediliction for " AVENIA," 
because it was the first composition I attempted from the 
most generous motives, namely, to vindicate injured in- 
nocence, and advocate the rights of man ; and I believe 
I was assisted to prepare that book for the press by some 
supernatural power, for no person saw the MSS. much 
less corrected it, till it was sent to the press. And when 
I remember my profound ignorance, when I commenced 
writing that book, and that I did not know what a semi- 
colon, a note of admiration, or quotation mark meant, 
I cannot help believing that the Almighty ordered it so 
that he might confound the wise, the scientific, the phi- 
losophic advocates of moral corruption, by the simple ar- 
gumentation of an illiterate child of nature. The plan, 
the design, the arrangement of that Poem is, however, 
perfectly original, though the versification is imitated, as 
the title page specifies. I availed myself of similitudes 
I had seen, and copied pieces I had read. And where is 
the author the most profound that does not do the same, 
though, no doubt, more careful in their transposition than 






* I have often asked Christians for a drink of water, and they 
would not give it : whereas savages have regaled me with palm 
vine without asking for it. 

C 2 



30 

I was. Even Virgil, the prince of Latin poets, copied 
Homer also. Hear what Pope says on this point : 

" If Achilles be absent from the army, on the score of 
aquarrel, through half the poem, Rinaldo is absent just 
as long on the same account. If Homer gives his hero a 
suit of celestial armour, Virgil and Tasso make the same 
present to theirs. Virgil has not only observed this 
close imitation of Homer, but where he had not led the 
way, supplied the want from other Greek authors. Thus 
the story of Sinon and the taking of Troy was copied 
(says Macrobius) almost word for word from Pesander, 
as the loves of Dido and jEneas are taken from those of 
Medsea and Jason, in Appolonius, and several others in 
the same manner." See the preface to Pope's Homer's 
Iliad, published in folio, London, A. D. 1715. 

Those who find fault with *' Avenia" could, perhaps, 
compose a better poem on the same subject, but for my 
part, I must declare (though I have now an hundred 
times more acquired information, than I had fifteen 
years ago, when I commenced that performance) that I 
could not even now, with my utmost endeavours, pre- 
pare one equal to it, though all the books in the world 
were at my command. 

It will be necessary, before we transcribe the episode, 
to inform the reader, that it is introdticed in that part of 
the poem, where the Christians gam a reinforcement of 
800 troops, which disheartens the prince and general of 
the African forces. The following day he is killed by 
stratagem, his army annihilated, his king and father, and 
family, and people butchered, and their city burned to 
the ground. What interests me so much in these me- 
lancholy verses is, the personal knowledge I have of the 
barbarity of the Christians, and the hospitality of the Af- 
ricans. A new edition of Avenia, which is now out of 
print, has been published by a bookseller, from a copy 
corrected and revised, gratis, by Dr. Atlee, a respecta- 
ble and amiable physician of Philadelphia, whose urbani- 
ty is only commensurate with his erudition. I cannot 
forbear to express the gratitude I feel to this ^*Friend,^^ 
who, of his own accord, transcribed the whole bookj 
though between three and four hundred pages. 



31 

" LouvERTURE's fierce approach they think they hear, 
In every wiiul, and ev'ry moment fear : 
He like a fury toss'd the scatt'ring throng, 
Drove waves on waves of trenibling foes along. 
So flees a herd of cows that hear dismay M 
The lion roaring through the midnight shade ; 
On heaps they tumble with successless haste, 
The savage seizes, draws, and rends the last. 
Nor with less free the stern LOurERTURE flew, 
Stil press'd the r ut, and still the hiudniost slew. 
His chiefs pursue their leader with delight, 
Rush fui iou 5 on, and claim their native right ; 
None stood behind, and none to plunder stood, 
All fight heroic, prodigal of bl >od. 
Now, lo ! the prince beheld far oi' the sea, 
Full twenty ships all plough the wat'iy way ; 
Strait for the shore the tilting vessels stand. 
Then furl their sails and anchor near the land ; 
Each held full forty troops, a cruel train, 
And each prepares to match the hostile plain* 
The victors see, and sicken'd at the sight. 
The victors see, and stop the flying fight, 
And while the sight the sable host appals. 
The robbers, trembling, gain their wooden walls ; 
All, pale and panting, g=iin their ships, tho* late. 
The ruffians breathe, d^liver*d from their fate. 

Now whirling down the skies the purple day. 
Shot thro' the western clouds a dewy ray ; 
Imperial Sol shrouds his refulgent lii^ht, 
Then rose majestic, Cynthia, queen of night. 
To melancholy rest the host retire, 
And no sweet note sounds from the feather'd quire ; 
Still with his lustre and his golden light, 
Bright Phoebus decks the glorious queen of night ; 
Wide o*er ur mighty globe with pomp she drew 
Her silver chariot, hung with pearly dew. 
Now man and beast lie hush'd ; sleep steals away 
The hero's wo and labours of »he day, 
All night in arms each valiant warrior lay ; 
All but the prince with anxious thoughts oppress'd, 
His father's cares lay rolling in his breast. 
As when the louring clouds at midnight hours 
Foretel the patt'ring hail, or weighty show'rs ; 
And i.BW the lightnings flash, and now expire. 
And heav*n flames thick with momf ntary fire. 
So bursting frpquent from louverture*s breast. 
Sighs following sighs, his inward grief confessed. 
Now o*er the fields dejected he surveys. 
From fifty ships, full fifty fires blaze ; 
He hears, or thinks he hears their music bloWs» 
And seems to hear the voices of the foe ; 



I 



32 



And looking forward to the fleet and coast. 

Anxious he sorrows for his father's host. 

Inly he gjroans, while duty and despair 

Divide his heart, and wage a doubtful war : 

A thousand cares his lab'ring bi east revolves, 

To seek sage c^aco now the chief resolves ; 

With him in wholesome eouncil to debate, 

What yet remains to save th' *vfflicted state. 

He rose, and rising cast his mantle round. 

Next on his feet in haste his sandals bound ; 

A lion's yellow skin his back conceal'd. 

His waiHke hand a painted jav'lin held. 

Meanwhile mgndingo press'd with equal woes. 

Alike deny'd the gift of soft repose ; 

Weeps fpr his sire, who f^r his son before, 

So much had sufFer'd, and must suffer more. 

A panther's spoils he round his shoulders spread. 

The sharp white teeth gnn'd horrid at his head. 

He grasp'd a javMn in his hand, and ran 

To meet his brother, the intrepid man: 

Already wak'd, T^ouvERTUREhe descry *d. 

All melar.choly, leaning on his side; 

Joyful they met ; mgndingo thus began : 

*' Why puts my brother his rich mantle on ? 

Sends he some spy amidst these silent hours. 

To S; y yon fleet, and watch the Christian povv'rs ? 

Bui say, what warrior shall sustain that task ? 

Such bold exploits uncommon courage ask. 

Guideless, alone, thro' nights dark shades to go. 

And midst the hostile shore explore the foe." 

To whom the prince, "In such distress we stand f 

I fear not decades but an host will land S- 

O' fues. This moment all our cares demand ; j 

Our all to save is liow no easy part. 

But asks high wisdom, policy, and art ; 

I fear that Africans unborn will tell 

Our woes, and curse the battle where we fell ; 

Then speed thy hasty course along the plain. 

Convene our chiefs, our chiefs of mighty fame ; 

Ourself 10 hoary qu ago shall repair ; 

To keep the guard on duty, be thy care." 

To whon^ MGNDINGO, •* These thy orders borne, 

Say shall I stay, or with dispatch return ?" 

** There shalt thou stay, (the mournful prince reply'd) 

Else we may miss to meet, without a guide ; 

Still with your voice the slothful warriors raise, 

Urge, by their father's fame, their jRiture praise ; 

Forget this night your state and lofty birth, 

Now works, and works alone, must prove your worth; 

To labour is the lot of man below, 

Few are our days, and full of care and wo.'* 



33 



This said, each parted to his sev'ral cares, 

The prince to quACO instantly repairs. 

Soon as he mov'd across the purple plain. 

Where hills of agonizing foes were slain, 

He hears a groan, and as he hears, he stands. 

And grasps his sword and jav'lin in his hands. 

Lo ! as he stood amongst the heaps of dead, 

He saw a fainting ruffian where he bled. 

There sad h« met the cruel hawkins' son, 

Large painful dro[)S from all his members run ; 

An arrows head still rooted in his wound. 

The crimson blood in circles mark'd the ground ; 

His fainting groans confessed his mighty smart, 

Weak were his cries, and panting was his heart : 

The day before, all wounded as he fled, 

He fell, and falling, mingled with the dead. 

Mov'd with kind pity and patbetic wo. 

He in the wretched man forgets the foe ; 

Divine compassion touch'd louverture's breast, 

Who, sighing, thus his bleeding foe address'd : 

••Ah ! hapless leader of the Christian host. 

Thus must you perish on a foreign coast ; 

Is this your fate, to glut the beasts with gore. 

Far from your friends, and from your native shore? 

Unhappy man, doom'd thus to die with shame. 

End thus the period of your life and fame." 

The foe looks wishfully, no word he said. 

With tears, 'twas all he couid, the robber pray'd ; 

He lifts his hands, the tears pour down amain. 

As he lay languid on the crimson plain ; 

Thrice, full of pain, he strove in vain to say, 

Thrice op'd his lips but not a word found way. 

The prince still view'd the fainting chief with wo, 

While down his cheek celestial sorrows flow. 

And thus he spoke : *' Then what remains to do ? 

Th' events of things kind Jove alone can view ; 

Charg'd with my father's care, with speed I fly. 

To hear my father's friend, qGaco's reply ; 

But thy distress this instant claims relief,'* 

He said, and in his arms upheld the chief; 

His guards the prince's slow approach survey'd, 

A lira's hide they on the ground displayed ; 

There stretch 'd at length the wounded ruffian lay, 

LouvEUTURE cut the poison'd steel away : 

Then in his hand a bitter root he bruis'd. 

The wound he suck'd, the styptic juice infus'd ; 

The closing flesh that instant ceas'd to glow. 

The wound lo torture, and the blood to flow. 

Th.n to the guards the godlike hero said, 

•* Lo ! now I go beyond yon heaps of dead, 

To meet our chieftains near the silent wood. 



I 



■ I 

OW.J 



34 

You nourish the poor man with wine and food ; 
What for yourselves youM want, provide for him, 
To Jove we owe this, and our fellow men ; 
By Jove the wretched and the fioor are sentj 
To try our hearts, relent then, guards relent, 
For know what you now give to Jove is lent. 
What for ourselves we can is always ours. 
This night let due repast refresh his pow'rs ; 
For strength consists in spirits and in blood, 
And those are ow'd to gen'rous wine and food. 
With lukewarm water wash his gore away. 
With healing balms his raging smart allay : 
And thou, poor Christian, thus consumed with wo, 
The anxious cares that nourish grief, forego ; 
Steep'd in thy blood, and in the dust outspread, 
Thou ly'st neglected on the piles of dead; 
None by to weep thee, to reli'/v e thee none, 
Were we, like Christians, turned tojlinty stone ! 
My poor, unhappy, tho' my guilty foe. 
We feel your grief, sad monument of woe 
We feel your grief, while tears unbidden flo^ 
Since Jove impels us thus our grace to give. 
Then share our bounty, and consent to live. 
Relieve him guards, I charge you, and t elent. 
We'll want, perhaps, the succour we have lent ; 
Relieve him till the messenger of day ^ 

Strikes the blue mountains with her golden ray.'' > 
The hero said, and strode in haste away. 3 

Louverture will be looked upon as a heathen, and, of 
•curse, with contempt by religionists ; who walk ^vtty 
Sunday with their prayers under th^ir arms, and with 
sanctimonious countenances, to superb buildings called 
the churches of Christ; and thus the good Samaritan 
was looked upon by the levite and the priest who officia- 
ted in the synagogue every Sabbath. But I would ask 
who listened to, and forthwith obeyed, the spirit of truth ? 
I mean the third person in the Holy Trinity, whose posi- 
tive command, to sage and savage, is "love your neigh- 
bour, and learn from my kindness to you all to be kind 
lo one another ;'' Louverture and the good Samaritan, or 
our modern sectarians. Few has had a better opportu- 
nity to answer this interrogation than myself, as I have 
travelled by land and water hundreds of miles amongst 
the one, and thousands amongst the other. To the Af- 
ricans, I have been a deadly foe, yet they treated me as a 
friend, to my Christian cotemporaries I have been a 



■"■ ' """"^"^ 



35 



most ardent friend, yet they have treated me s 
The first have accommodated me in my extremi 
without solicitation or any compensation, with 
they possessed ; the last have absolutely refuse 
drink of cold water, when I was thirsty, though ] 
solicited for it. This I declare is the truth, an 
particularize numerous anecdotes, connected wit 
perience, to illucidate and consolidate the above 

IJiave been often astonished, in my extensive 
to find so great a contrast in professors of Chr 
who had the word religion always playing up 
lips, and in Heathens, who did not even unden 
etimology of the word. I have often wondei 
was the cause the simple unletteredlllii^ildren c 
imitated the author of nature, in his most 
characteristic, I mean benevolence, more than 
€)f science and the daughters of polite literati 
that savages, who never heard one sermon or 
should be more charitable than those who hear 1 
year. 

The cause now appears obvious to me, to wi 
are called civilized and polished nations, are div 
subdivided into diiFerent corps or societies, such 
cal, military, literary, religious, &c. ; each of tV 
their pecularities in apparal, in principles, in o{ 
prejudices, and even in phraseology. Each h 
writers, their preachers, their orators, whosi 
sermons, orations, are often jn opposition, an( 
subordination to the lav/s of nature ; their parti 
stead of investigating the book of creation, they 1 
to the books of ignorant prejudiced men. Ir 
listening to the voice of God in their conscien 
only listen to the eloquent voices of their siniste] 



• .36 

house by your pride^ your perverseness^ your petulenee^ 
your prejudice^ your passion. I exhibit the truth^ 
'which only can lead you to happiness and " make you free 
indeed y^' but you reject it^ and embrace the opposite er* 
tor,, which is replete with ruin and misery to yourselves^ 
end to your species. For it is one of my immutable laws, 
that no man shall fnd happiness in promoting^ directly or 
indirectly^ the misery of manJ^^ Thus the celestial mon- 
itor is incessantly recalling us from those partition w^Us 
and prejudices which separate the human family, and 
thus metamorphose natural friends to vmnatural foes, and 
produce a thousand diabolical evils which precipitate mil- 
lions of men into misery and wretchedness most pro- 
found. Notwithstanding all our accumulated and com- 
plicated criminality, and particularly our base ingratitude, 
he is continually doing all he can, consistent with his at- 
tributes and our free agency, to win us to our own hap- 
piness. And, like a kind parent, who reluf tantly whips 
his child to cure him of his rebellious disposition, so 
does our kind and gracious Creator and Redeemer put 
whips into the hands of kings and priests, and verily ! 
verily ! ! they use them with a vengeance ! ! ! Ye 
who doubt this assertion, look for a moment, with the 
eyes of your mind, to Europe, Asia, and Africa, and deny 
it if you can. Yet, notwithstanding all the mountains of 
misery produced by this necessary coercive measure, mil- 
lions of ungrateful servile mortals continue to worship 
their villainous kings, and, at the same time, treat with si- 
lent and sovereign contempt their only legitimate king 
that created them. They every where pay homage to 
hypocritical priests, and reject their gracious high priest, 
who died to redeem them, and also his blessed Gospel, 
which inculcates the most perfect philanthropy and refin- 
ed charity. But he not only puts our ills in the hands of 
royality, aristocracy, and Episcopacy, but on the other 
hand he puts our greatest blessings into the hands of the 
poor, the oppressed, the unlettered, children of nature. 



* The truth is not only rejected by partizans and sectarians, 
but the man who declares it is hated and rejected by them. This 
I have proved to be true from sad experience in many instances. 



jiilluiiuiifyHij|fumiH|Mmiuiiiii 



37 



We receive nothing biit misery, impositiou, anc 
from the first ; and, on the contrary, we receivi 
sures, our aliment, our apparel, our coffins, froi 
Yet, astonishing ingratitude, inconsistency, in 1 
the first we bow down and worship with a cri 
vility, and the last we pity and despise. Alas 
misled and ruined man, yet he is worshipped v, 
and exhibited as a saint, and sometimes as a 
death ; while God, the source of all goodnes 
continually using every possible means to lead 
path of truth and happiness, is exhibited as an c 
tyrant, who will send such children of nature t 
ture to hell for not believing a doctrine they nevej 
could hear, and plunge infants from their mothers 
the same dismal abode, because, forsooth, th< 
neglected to have them sprinkled with water bi 
death ; and even have infants, a span long, conv 
their mothers womb down to the womb of pei 
the sin of their forefather Adam. These are s 
of the errors which have been promulgated froi 
and pulpit ; and their authors have been eulo 
abundantly rewarded, while I, who exhibit thi 
truths have been insulted to my face, calumnia 
my back, cheated out of my property and good 
left without a friend on earth. 

But what seems to me the greatest misfortur 
the improbability of any person, who is a big( 
ber of a corps, ever to listening any other rea 
what is sanctioned and supported by his pai 
they only are acquainted with one side of the 



38 

and, finally, who can point out the diameter, the circum- 
ference, the periodical revolutions of the planets which 
compose our solar system, from Mercury to the Georgium 
Sidus ; and, in addition to this display of natural philoso- 
phy, the right reverend father in God, lord bishop of Wa- 
terford, steps forward to display the super-eminent doc- 
trines of the Bible, and the super-celestial wisdom and 
goodness displayed in the plan of salvation by faith, &c. 
&c. Yet of what avail is all this natural philosophy and 
theological eloquence, if the philosopher and the divine 
are both destitute of faith in, and gratitude to, the Divine 
author of nature and of revelation. The fact is, if they 
know the excellency of the Divine character, and will not 
love, adore, and glorify him, they act just like the devil, 
who sees, believes, and trembles, but does not love. But 
what caps the climax of the criminality of too many first- 
rate poets, politicians, theologians, mathematicians, and, 
in one word, the proficients in literature, polite and pro- 
found, is this : They too often not only refuse to " look 
through nature up to nature's God" with supreme grati- 
tude, and to glorify their benevolent and legitimate 
king with profound humility, but they do, at the same 
time, bow down with all lowliness at the feet of the proud, 
puny, petulent, proposterous animals called emperor's, 
princes, earls, dukes, and lords; and pay the homage due 
only to God to such ignorant, guilty, tyrannical men who 
assume the title, usurp the authority, and demand the 
worship due to the Lord of nature only. Hence, and in 
this instance, such ungrateful, such servile miscreants are 
worse than the devil. 

In the different corps or societies, philosophical, politi- 
cal, and religious, there are a diversity of opposite opi- 
nions, interests, and hypothesis ; but in no party is opi- 
nions, so diametrically opposite, advanced and confuted, 
supported and censured, as on the subject of revealed re- 
ligion. Millions of books have been written,- and ser- 
mons preached, by each party, which tended to destroy, 
instead of supporting, true religion ; I mean supreme 
gratitude to God, and corresponding affection to his 
creatures, both animal and human. But a contrast in opi- 
nion is not confined to religious controversialists. In phi- 
losophy, also, we often find a perfect contrast in opinion 



|||||HIUIIfyHlj|MiUlilMMmiuiUl 



39 



amongst its votaries ; but happily this diversit; 
ion does not produce animosity, hatred, calu 
rack, the halter, the fire, the faggot, as it has do 
religious controversialists, to the disgrace of 
virtue, true religion, and even common humani 
I will pass by, with an astonished silence, th 
of victims who have been immolated in the nan^ 
and by the ministers of his holy religion, with a 
tic cruelty which none but diabolical spirits cou 
because, forsooth, they differed on some triflin 
in theology from their cruel and bigoted c 
However, I will refer the reader to the book of 
"vvhere he will see the super-inhuman* catalog! 



* In order to see a specimen of the fruits of error, i 
count of the Inquisition, re-established by king Ferdin^ 
sired. 

The following is the decree of the king of Spain, n 
ing the inquisition, published in a supplement to the iV 
zette, 23d of July, 1814 :— 

** The king, our lord, has been pleased to enact thi 
decree. The glorious title of Catholic, by which t\ 
Spain are distinguished among the other Christian p 
cause they do not tolerate in their kingdom any one v 
ses another religion than the Catholic Apostolic and ^ 
powerfully excited my heart to employ all the means 
has placed in my hands, in order to make myself \\\ 
The past troubles and war which afflicted all the p 
the kingdom during the space of six years ; the reside 
in, during that time, of foreign troops of different sects, 
infected with abhorrence and hatred to the Catholic re] 



40 

which is enough to mate a midnight assassin melt into 
tears. We find, in the commonwealth of literature, some 
disagr«e who are proficients in Euclid, algebra, naviga- 



tribunal of the holy office should return to the exercise of its ju- 
risdiction. Upon which subject wise and virtuous prelates, and- 
many corporations and serious persons, both ecclesiastical and se- 
cular, have represented to me that it was owing to this tribunal 
that Spain was not contaminated in the 16th century, with the 
errors that caused so much affliction in other kingdoms, the na- 
tion fioiirishing at that time in all Iiinds of literature, in great men, 
in holiness and virtue. And that one of the principal means em- 
ployed by the oppressor of Europe^ in order to sow corruption 
and discord, fronn which he derived so many advantages, was to 
destroy it under pretence that the light of the age could not bear 
its continuance any longer ; and which afterwards the self-styled 
Cortes, with the same pretence, and that of the constitution which 
they had tumultuously framed, annulled, to the great sorrow of 
the natioTn. Wherefore, they have ardently requested me to re- 
establish that tribunal ; and, according to the requests and the 
wishes of the people, who, from the love to the religion of their 
fathers, have restored, of their own accord, some of the subaltern 
tribunal to their functions, I have resolved that the holy office 
should be restored and continued in the exercise of their jurisdic- 
tion, i)oth ecclesiastical, which, at the request of, my august pre- 
decessors, the pontiffs gave to it, and the royal, which the kings 
granted to it, observing, in the exercise of both, the ordinances by 
which they were governed in 1808, and the laws and processions 
which, to avoid certain abuses, and moderate some privileges, it 
was mete to take at different times. As besides these provisions 
it may be suitable to adopt others, and my intention being to im- 
prove this estabhshment that the greatest utility may arise to my 
subjects from it, I wish, that as soon as the council of the inquisi- 
tion shall meet, two of its members, with two others of my royal 
council, both of which I shall nominate, should examine the form 
and mode of proceeding in the causes appertaining to the holy of- 
fice, and the method established for the censure and prohibition 
of books ; and if there should be found any thing in it contrary to 
the good of my subjects, and the upright administration of justice^ 
or that pught to be altered, it shall be proposed to me, that I may 
determine what shall be proper. This comaiunicated for your 
information, and whom it may concern. 
•♦ Palace, 2ist July, 1814. 

THE KING. 
*• To Don Pedro de Macanaz.*' 

*' ACT OF FAITH.—In the Romish Church is a solema day 
held by the inquisition for the punishment of heretics and the ab- 
solution of the iDDOGent accused. They usually contrive the Auto 



41 



tion, mensuration, mineralogy, but none of the votaries of 
the arts and sciences differ so essentially as the profes- 
sors of natural philosophy. Some naturalists, of eminent 



to fall on some great festival, that the execution may pass with 
more awe and regard, at least it is always on a Sunday. The 
jiuto da Fe, or Jet of Faith, may be called the last act of the in- 
quisitorial tragedy ; it is a kind of gaol delivery, appointed as of- 
ten as a competent number of prisoners, in the inquisition are 
convicted of herssy, either by their own voluntary or extorted 
confession, or on the evidence of certain witnesses. The process 
is thus :— In the morning they are brought into a g\-eat hall, where 
they have certain habits put on, which they are to wear in the 
procession. The procession is led up by Dominiciao friars, after 
which come the penitents, some with san benitoes and some with- 
out, according to the nature of the crimes, being all in black 
coats without sleeves, and barefooted, with a wax candle in their 
hands ; these are followed by the penitents who have narrowly 
escaped being burnt, who, over their black coats, have painted 
with their points turaed downwards,yw6'^o revolto. Next come 
the negatived and relapsed, who are to be burnt, having flames 
on their habits painting upwards. After these come such as pro- 
fess doctrines contrary to the faith of Rome, who, besides flames 
pointing upwards, have their 'picture painted on their breasts, 
with dog5>, serpents, and devils, all open mouthed about it. Each 
prisoner is attended with a familiar of the inquisition : and those 
to be burnt have also a Jesuit on each hand, who is continually 
preaching to them to abjure. After the prisoners, come a troop 
of familiars on horseback, and, after them, the inquisitors and 
other officers of the court, on mules ; last of all, the inquisitor- 
general, on a white horse, led by two men with black hats and 
green hat bands. A scaffold is erected in the Tertero de Pacs, 
big enough for three thousand people ; at one end of which are 
the prisoners— at the other, the inquisitors. After a sermon, 
made up of encomiums of the inquisition and invectives against 
heretics, a priest ascends a desk near the middle of tiie scaffold!, 
and, having taken the abjuration of the penitents, recites the final 
sentence of those who are to be put to death, and delivers them 
to the secular arm, earnestly beseeching, at the same time, the 
Becular powers not to touch their blood, or put their lives in dan- 
ger. The prisoners being thus in the hands of the civil magis- 
trates, are presently loaded with chains and carried first to the 
secular gaol, and from thence, in an hour or two, brought before 
the civil judge, who, after asking in what religion they intend to 
die, pronounces sentence on such as declare they die in the com- 
munir.n of Home, that they shall be first strangled and then burnt 
to nihts ; on such as die in any other faith, that they De burnt 
alive Bnrh arc immediately carried to the Ribera, the place of 
execution, where there are as many stages set up as there are 

d2 



42 

abilities, who possess five talents while I possess one, con- 
tend that our solar system is the principal, if not the only 
one in creation. I am firm in the opinion that our Sun, with 
its s^en attendants, planets, and satellites, is but a small 
part of creation ; that each of the fixed stars are suns, the 
centre of systems as extensive and magnificient as our 
own. Some think they are not inhabited ; I contend, 
from analagy, that if a diminutive plant is pregnant with 
animal life, the hypothesis that the different enormous 
systems of creation are inhabited by beings capable of 
contemplating the sovereign beauty, and participating the 
benefits of the celestial architect, is consistent with rea- 
son as well as philosophy. Many naturalists ascribe 
the phenomenon of tides ebbing and flowing to the laws 
®f gravity, i. e. to the attraction of the sun and moon on 
the equator, whereas the phenomena of our tides seems 
to me to proceed from the melting of the polar ices. 
Whether I am correct or incorrect in my supposition of 
the multiplication of systems in creation, or the pheno- 
mena of the tides by the polar effusions has no connec- 
tion, however, with the subject of our investigation^; our 
primary object is to demonstrate by reasonable, as well 



prisoners to be burnt, with a quantity of dry furs about them. 
The stakes of the professed, that is, such as persist in their he- 
resy, are about four yards high, having a small board towards 
the top for the prisoners to be seated on. The negatived and re- 
lapsed being first strangled and burnt, the professed mount their 
stakes by a ladder, and the Jesuits, after several repeated exhor- 
tations to be reconciled to the Church, part with them, telling 
them they leave them to the devil, who is standing at their elbow 
to receive their souls and carry them with him into the flames of 
kell. On this a great shout is raised, and the cry is, Let the dog's 
beards be marf^— which is done by thrusting flaming furzes fast- 
ened to long poles against their faces till they are burnt to a coal, 
which is accompanied with the loudest acclamations of joy. At 
last fire is set to the furze at the bottom of the stake over which 
the professed are chained so high that the top of the flame seldom 
reaches higher than the board they sit on ; so that they rather 
seem roasted than burnt. There cannot be a more lamentable 
spectacle ; the sufferers continually cry out, while they are able, 
Misericordia per amor de Dios. " Pity for the love of God !" yet 
it is beheld by all sexes and ages with transports of joy and ^%\i&' 
isiciion"'^£ncyclojiadia BrUanniQa, 



45 

as philosophical deductions, that God has made ample 
provision for the luxuriant accommodation of all his 
creatures, both animal and human ; and if any are un- 
happy or miserable it is man that made them so. I have, 
in my voyage to the bay of Honduras, and while sailing 
round divers desolate islands near the Spanish Maine, 
taken notice of the harmony and happiness that appeared 
to exist between the different species of animals, of birds, 
and of reptiles. It appeared to me, that being delivered 
from the ravages of man, they enjoyed uninterrupted 
happiness. These islands I perceived were plentifully 
supplied with various trees, and herbage, and spontaneous 
fruits, for the plentiful support of quadrupeds, which 
made them their local residence as well as for the itine- 
rant amphibious animals that resorted thither periodically 
for aliment or shelter, or to deposit their eggs : finally 
thither flew numerous species of birds at the approach of 
storms and tempests, and found a secure asylum ; many 
of them were most beautiful to behold. Perhaps it will 
be allowed that in warm climates, such as the bay of 
Honduras, all birds, animals, and insects, are plentifully 
provided with all necessary aliment ; but it may be ob- 
jected that nature is not equally prolific in the cold north- 
em latitudes, such as Norway and Russia. As I have also 
visited these countries, and others in the same latitudes, 
I can easily answer this objection. However, one simple 
geographical fact will be sufficient to do it, viz : It is 
well known that no nation carries on a more extensive 
trade in peltry than the northern regions, which chiefly 
supplies the markets of all Europe. The fact is, in no 
countries are birds and beasts, of various species, more 
abundant than in those cold climates, such as wolves, 
white bears, elks, rein deers, water fowls, heathcocks, 
hares, foxes, ermines, beavers, martens, &c, &c. ; but the 
fecundity of fishes is here superabundant : I have seen 
them taken up in buckets and baskets in Norway, they 
were so plentiful, and in such shoals. There is a greater 
variety of species, and each species are m.ore numerous 
here than in any other part of the world. There are 
more herrings to be caught in these northern rivers and 
seas than would supply all the inhabitants of Europe and 
America, not to speak of the sturgeon, cod, aDichovie.s, 



44j 

mackarel, pike, salmon, sea-dogs, porpoises, sea-cows, 
whales, and many others too tedious to enumerate. But 
it Will be objected that both birds and quadrupeds suffer 
for aliment, and perish with the severity of the winter in 
•the northern regions. To this I would answer, that the 
God of nature is equally careful in accommodating the 
animals of the northern regions with furs and long thick 
hair, which regularly grow in winter aud fall off in the 
summer: as he is in providing the animals of the southern 
hemisphere with thin hair, light and cool ; witness the 
African lion, whose skin I have seen as sleek as a mole,, 
while the wolf of Siberia is shaggy all over, even up to 
his eyes. But the gracious Creator, blessed be his holy 
name, is not only careful to cover their backs with fur, 
but he builds a house over their heads : witness the lofty 
and ever-green firs, whose spreading branches ward off the 
snow storm from the defenceless quadrupeds, and also 
preserves the moss in some places two feet thick for the 
aliment of the reindeer, who, when the snow covers it, 
are all stimulated by instinct to paw the snow away and 
find a plentiful aliment, provided by their benevolent cre- 
ator through the severity of winter. In many places na- 
ture has also provided abundance, not only of the soft and 
dry leaves of trees and moss, but a variety of spontaneous 
fruits, which being arrived at maturity, fall at the ap- 
proach of winter : thus the kind king of heaven provides 
abundantly a house, apparel, and luxuriant aliment for 
animals and insects in the northern as well as the south- 
ern latitudes. 

I would here observe, as I go along, that it is not the 
fecundity of animals, birds, and fishes, which are facili- 
tated by the cold (which we have been taught to consider 
as one of the greatest obstacles to pro creation as well as 
vegetation) but also plants, for in Russia and Norway 
we find trees of the tallest growth ; it is only on Mount 
Lebanon where v/e find the majestic cedar, and in the 
woodlands of Russia where we find the fir tree growing to 
a prodigious size, and, in one word, the largest forests in 
the w^orkL If it was not so, how could England import 
her iron, her timber, her hemp, and other naval stores 
from Russia, Prussia, and Bvxden. The fact is, although 
I have travelled to t!iree quarters of the globe, the largest 



45 

ship I ever saw was a Russian man-of-war, built by Rus- 
sian timber, mounting 110 large guns. Finally, I will be 
bold to assert, that the numerous species of squirrel can 
scamper from branch to branch, without touching the 
ground, with as great facility in Russia, as 1 have seen 
the monkeys hopping from tree to tree in South America. 
I think I can affirm that no part of the world is more 
healthful than the cold regions of the north, and no where 
do we find less epidemical disorders. In warm and tem- 
perate climates we allow pestilential disorders afFeet the 
human race ; but is not man to blame for these calami- 
ties : without any manner of doubt. In warm latitudes 
nature provides volcanoes, thunder, tempests, and 
storms to ventulate the air, and to hinder the waters of 
lakes, rivers, and creeks, from becoming stagnated and 
putrid ; and where man has not acted in opposition to 
nature : these are the most wholesome regions of the 
earth. 

There are some parts of St* Domingo where it is as- 
serted that the natural malignity of the air is productive 
of contagious disorders ; this may be a fact, though I al- 
ways found that island healthful when I visited it. Yet 
I will contend in one word, that there would not be an 
unwholesome spot on earth, if man either civilized or 
savage, had not directly or indirectly, altered the course 
of nature, or neglected to remove the putrid substances 
which naturally produce pestilential disorders. We 
might dwell largely on this part of our subject, but as my 
limits are circumscribed, 1 can only touch upon the seve- 
ral topics, in order to leave room for more necessary 
matter. And what I consider more necessary matter is 
this, viz. to demonstrate by the most reasonable argu- 
mentation, that it is entirely owing to the cruelty, vanity, 
and folly of man, and not the want of economy or beni- 
ficence in the author of nature, that the numerous ills of 
life are imputable. This earth I do contend contains 
every pre-request to produce a terrestrial paradise, for 
the luxuriant accommodation of all creatures, animal and 
human, was it only uncontaminated by the folly and 
pride of man. This fact I could prove to a demonstra-- 
tion, would my limits allow it, and could I find language 
to clothe the innumerable thoughts which croud my 



46 

mind on this subject, but which are too big to be borne 
alive. 

All animals not under the controul of man, by obey- 
ing the dictates of nature, enjoy as great a proportion of 
happiness as they can bear. But man renders himself, 
his species, and all animals under his baneful influence 
miserable, by continually acting in opposition to the laws 
of nature. 

I would ask among all the countless species and fami- 
lies of quadrupeds, reptiles, birds, or the most savage 
beasts of prey, where do we find one exercising the same 
cruelty to its offspring as man does to his. The lioness 
and she bear, when wounded by the artillery of man will 
die defending their cubs ; and notwithstanding the agonies 
of death expire licking them. 1 once drowned the puppies 
of a female Spaniel, she plunged into the water after them 
and carefully conveyed them, one by one, though dead, 
to her kennel, and for some time licked them, and strove 
to cause them to suck, and when she found her endea- 
vours in vain, she scratched the earth with her fore-paws 
and forthwith deposited them in their shallow graves. 
Not only the beasts and birds bring up and instruct their 
young without coercive discipline ; but even the unlet- 
tered savages do not use the dint of blows and flagella- 
tion, in the education of their offsprings, as those who 
call themselves civilized and christianized unfortunately 
do. I will be bold to affirm, that in no heathen nation, 
is both pedagogues and parents so cruel to children as in 
Christendom. The savage treats his child with gentle- 
ness, and is beloved and nurtured by him in his old 
age : but the civilian who looks upon the savage with 
contempt, whips his child for every trifling misdemeanour, 
and employs a preceptor to do the same ; by these co- 
ercive measures he loses the affections of his child for- 
ever, as well as his filial tenderness, a just re-action of 
Divine Providence. Alas, how the sentiments of nature 
are stifled by a false education, and by the tyranny of 
custom. 

How often do we see those who are proud of their rich- 
es and politeness, send their new born babes to be nursed 
by strange women, perhaps miles from their paternal 
home. Yet little do such unnatural parents think, that 



47 

thes« same children, will behold, with the same apathy, 
thtir coffins conveyed to their graves, as they once be- 
held their cradles conveyed to their nurses. 1 can speak 
on this common outrage on the laws of nature by sad 
experience. My father put myself and four brothers and 
sisters, to different nurses, chiefly in the country. It 
was my lot to be put to nurse with a Mrs. Regan, a wife 
of one of my fathers domestics, who was k'md to me, 
and I always loved her much better than I did my pa- 
rents. This unnatural mode of educating children, I con- 
sider one of the greatest misfortunes of civilized society, 
and pregnant with a thousand evils to both parents and 
children. From the time that I was five, until I arrived 
at the age of fourteen years, my life was a continual 
scene of misery, owing to the cruelty of my preceptors ; 
so much so, that I was perfectly stupified. And I do 
believe a child of common capacity, could learn as much 
in nine months as 1 did in nine years. I recollect one 
morning I repeated my task in grammar verbatim, to 
one of my school-fellows, previous to my appearing be- 
fore my cruel pedagogue; and when I was called up to 
say my task to him I was so terrified that I could not 
r«peat one word of it, and was of course flagellated until 
I was all in a gore of blood. 

Can such children help detesting such cruel parents 
and preceptors : it is impossible. Do they not procure 
for themselves the hatred, instead of the gratitude of the 
generation which is advancing to replace them ; and will 
they not by a natural reaction, by neglect, disobedience, 
and contempt, repay them for their cruelty. Without any 
manner of doubt. Some cavellers will perhaps object to 
my antecedent assertion, viz. " that all animals and birds 
were kinder and more aff*ectionate to their oflspring than 
the proud and polite sons of civilization," and point to 
the case of sea fowl, reptiles, and amphibious animals, 
who deposit their eggs in the sand and leave them for the 
rays of the sun to hatch. I would answer : this mode of 
pro-cfeation being agreeable to the necessary order of na- 
ture, and answerable to every valuable purpose, we 
always find that these species of birds, reptiles, &c. arc 
as prolific as any other in creation. The instinct they 
manifest the moment they leave the shell and sand, is 



48 

truly astonishing, and demonstrates the wonderful cane 
and economy of nature. One day walking along the 
margin of a mighty forest in South America, a few de- 
grees from the mouth of the great river Amazon, I hap* 
pened to see an aperture in the sand where a Tyger had , 
been previously scratching, as I supposed for a turtle's 
nest. This I knew to be the case from the prints of his 
large paws in the sand, and as I knew them to be numer- 
ous in that vast wilderness : I therefore examined the 
spot and found it to be even so. I took up one of the 
eggs, opened it and found a small turtle, about the cir- 
cumference of a half dollar. I immediately put it down 
on the sand, when lo, in a moment it took its course di- 
rectly to the ocean, which was twenty yards distance. 

I should have mentioned the amazing instinct of the 
birds of the northern latitudes, at the approach of winter's 
gloomy reign. It is well know that previous to the com- 
mencement of a tempest or huricane in the south seas, 
the sea fowl will speed their hasty course directly to the 
Islands scattered through the ocean for their accommo- 
dation, and safely shelter there. Nature gives them am- 
ple notification ; they always obey and are preserved. 
In like manner, millions of birds of different species (obe- 
dient to the never failing calls of nature, at the approach 
of winter which they always know beforehand) may be 
seen in clouds, flying in a parrallel direction to a more 
temperate climate ; yet, without compass or pilot ! they 
.speed their course over vast oceans, in a direct line and 
never miss their track till they arrive at their well known 
islands of the southern seas. I have myself seen large 
floeks of birds from the frozen lakes of Canada, cower 
down after their aerial voyage on the Caribee Islands, of 
the Atlantic Ocean. I shot but four birds in my life, and 
three of them was from the above flocks. If the God of 
nature is thus careful of the birds of the air, will he not 
also take care of you, oh ye children of misfortune, if 
you will like them prove obedient to his intellectual man- 
date ! most assuredly he will. But if you will not obey 
his call, miserable you must be ; and yourselves alone are 
the authors of your misery, as evidently so as I am the 
author of this book, which is written oft times with intel- 
lectual pain and sorrow, in order to benefit you with the 



49 

view of pleasing God alone ; and I know, whether you. 
are benefited or not, he is pleased if my motives are 
pure. Yes, I have no doubt that this performance though 
precipitate, succinct, and desultory ; is intended by him, 
who calls the pelican at the approach of a hurricane, to 
seek refuge from the howling tempest and roaring seas, 
in the bosom of the picturesque island, planted in the 
ocean for her retreat. Thus, I believe these lines are in- 
tended to call the desperate child of misfortune to 
seek a secure asylum, from the storms of calamity in 
the bosom of God. 

He can thus call his intelligent rational offspring to 
their own happiness, but he cannot oi^ey for them. Tney 
must obey themselves or perish, the same as the pelican 
must unavoidably perish in the howling tempest, if she 
did not in time gain the safe covert of the luxuriant 
island. We will now make a few more oljservations on 
the gigantic evils resulting from our erroneous modern 
mode of education. What we have said, or, ind-ed, 
what all the naturalists, that is, or ever was in the world, 
could say, of the harmonies, the beauties, nad benefits of 
nature, when compared to what might be said on the sub- 
ject, is like comparing a drop of water to the ocean, or a 
grain of sand to a mountain. However, though we have 
said but little on the harmonies of nature, that little is 
sufficient to convince every sincere inquirer after truth, 
that the God of nature has, and does, and always will do 
all things well for those who obey his excellent laws ; and 
if what we have said will not satisfy the caveiier, neither 
would he be cured of his unreasonable doubts, though 
one arose from the dtad and pointed out the benefits of 
nature. They are blindest who will not see. To thou- 
sands of such I will present my book, but k will be like 
taking a horse that will not drink, to a clear spring ot 
water : I can lead the horse to the water, but cannot make 
him drink ? thus God providentially can put my book 
into the hands of men, who shut their eyes against the 
light, and basely insult their own better understanding, 
but he cannot, he will not compel them to see ; at least, 
not ivhile their day of probation lasts I ! I 

The sons of pride, of fortune, and of affluence, will 
not see ; but may I not hope that at least some of the 

E 



50 

enlightened children of misfortune, will be convinced by 
these friendly and'familiar strictures, that God only afflicts 
them to-day to reward them to-morrow: that he who hears 
and answers the birds when they cry for food, will also hear 
them, if they with equal simplicity and confidence pray 
to him : that there is no other means he can use, but 
calamity to compel (I should rather say prevail upon) 
them to seek refuge in his own bosom : that there is 
no way to attain the enjoyment of true happiness and 
solid tranquility, but by despising the vain pleasures and 
proud and pitiful pursuits of the lovers of this world t 
that if they will meet the approbation of the supreme 
creator, they must first love and be kind to his creatures: 
that if they wish God to forgive them much, they must 
love him much : that the least act of mercy, even a 
drink of cold water given privately^ to a suffering fellow 
creature, in the view of pleasing God only, is infinitely 
superior to the grandest works of the most ingenious 
authors political, theological, poetical, historical or philo- 
sophical, that ever put pen to paper; if their primary 
view therein was fame, i. e. the praise and approbation 
of man, or pecuniary emolument. But a word more on 
the faulty and fatal education of our youth. There is one 
line of a certain English poet, woefully demonstrated in 
christianized and civilized society, viz. " As the twig is 
bent the tree is inclined." We need not go far to see it 
realized. Generally, but not always, parents refuse to 
imitate the swallow that builds her nest on the tops of 
their houses. We all know that she not only abhors the 
use of stripes, cries and tears, to instruct her young, but 
contrariwise, she is continually on the wing, conveying 
to the nest the> nutriment most agreeable to the palate of 
her tender offspring. This nest being previously built with 
abundance of labour, precaution, tenderness and intelli- 
gence ; it is soft as down within, while without it is shel- 
tered from the cold and from the wind. Some, I will al- 
low, are as tender of their offspring as the swallow, but I 
am afraid the number comparatively is but few. For my 
part, the first thing I learned when I went to school, was 
cruelty, for children are imitative animals. The pedigogue 
tnay talk, and the pupil may forget ; but let him act, and 
he will remember, for actions speak louder thaa words. 



51 

Where is the use of preaching like a god, and acting like 
a devil. The preceptor says God is love, soon after he 
applies the scourge for some trifling fault or other, 
which leaves the weeping pupil to conclude that he is 
deluded or a hypocrite. But says one, " spare the rod 
and spoil the child." So says Solomon, the wisest of men ! 
But I would ask, what does one that was greater than 
Solomon say? " suffer little children to come unto me and 
forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of heaven." 
Solomon I will allow was the wisest of men, when he lis- 
tened too, and forthwith obeyed the God of nature, as the 
pelican does. But when he refused thus to obey, and 
suffered his mind to be alienated from God, who is deli- 
cate in love, and cannot endure a divided heart; he 
became the weakest and wickedest, because the most un- 
grateful of men. If it was not so, how could he bow 
down and worship the wooden gods of his ungodly wives, 
and thus treat with contempt the true God of Israel, who 
appeared to him twice, and crowned him with favours 
and blessings in super- abundance. The fact is, let our 
pedagogues with Solomon at their head, say what they 
choose, I do, and will contend that the mode of punish- 
ment commonly used in our seminaries, produces not 
only the physical and moral corruption of our children 
in particular, but of the nations of Christendom in general. 
I do contend that the first thing children learn when 
they go to school is cruelty. The pedigogue acts the 
tyrant, the children imitates him ; and when the school is 
dismissed, we too often see the elder children beating the 
younger ones, or stimulating them to fight each other, 
and if a drunken or delirious person happens to pass 
when they come out of school, you will assuredly see the 
scholars running after them, and pelting them with stones 
or mud. Such sights are not to be seen among savages. 
If you wish to make a child a hypocrite, you must first 
make him miserable : if you wish to make him cruel, 
flagellation will do the business. But where is the use of 
opposing the tyranny of cruel customs? it is like pouring 
water upon a gooses back ? However I will add a few 
more thoughts upon the subject of education, and if I 
can open the eyes of one tender parent, and thus save one 
innocent child from receiving a severe flagellation on his 



5S 

posteriors, in vain, I shall think myself well paid for my 
pains. I do verily believe if the numerous murderers 
and robbers who are executed in Christendom every year, 
which I will venture to say will amount to more than is 
executed on all the earth in twenty years ? I say, were 
they interrogated relative to the cause of their depravity, 
they would uniformly declare it originated exclusively, or 
began with the cruelty of their educators. I think go- 
vernment should prohibit this kind of punishment in our 
seminaries and ships, as they have already done in the 
American army. Is it not astonishing that men who are 
both scholastic and ecclesiastic teachers, should in the 
pulpit, preach on Sunday morning mildness, mercy and 
chastity, and on Monday morning lay bare the posteri- 
ors of an innocent half grown child, before fifty scholars, 
and flog him or her till perfectly lacerated ! Alas, little 
do such preceptors, and the parents who encourage them, 
think, that in thus doing to their pupils and children as 
they would not wish to be done by* Little I say, do they 
think the terrible re-actions which are preparing for them, 
and which is the natural product of their own barbarity. 
If there was no possible way to correct a stubborn disobe- 
dient child, but bj^ obscene and the most indecent flagel- 
lation, they would not be reprehensible, but this is not 
the case ? I should greatly rejoice if a law was passed by 
the national legislature, prohibiting all parents, precep- 
tors, and masters from flogging helpless children under 
their jurisdiction, subject to a fine of fifty dollars for 
every offence. 

But our modern mode of education is not only diame- 
trically opposite to the laws of nature, but also the laws 
of the lover of little children. He teaches mercy. The 
proud pedigogue, inculcates pride ? The first stimulates to 
humility, the last to emulation. The gracious redeemer 
says be the last, the cruel preceptor says be the first. 
But it would be an endless task to point out the dissimi- 
larity between the dispositions and doctrines of these two 
teachers ? And how distressing is the thought, yet how 
true, that he who teaches the most excellent virtue, 
refined morality, disinterested philanthropy and pure re- 
ligion is rejected, and they who by precept and example, 
stimulates to the practice of cruelty and ambition, are 



53 

obeyed through all Christendom. This fact is demonstrat- 
ed in the misery of countless millions of mankind. 1 
do not point exclusively to the men who suft'er them- 
selves to be cheated out of their property, their liberty, 
their reason and their common sense, by the grand Lama, 
the Bramins, and the priests of Jugernott ; but I point 
also to the priests and professors of the true christian 
divinity. These last preach humility, but practice am- 
bition ; they say, descend to the valley, while every eye 
not blinded by the tyrant, custom can see for themselves 
that they ascend to the mount of ambition, of grandeur. 
Christ well knew that humility was most suitable to our 
miserable mortality, and more calculated to promote our 
real happiness than even honours, scepters and crowns : 
or he would not so plainly and pointedly by precept and 
example have recommended it. When he was asked 
which of his disciples would be greatest, he pointed to sl 
little Piebian child, and said, whileh is voice was sweeter 
than the songs of angels, he " who is innocent and hum- 
ble like that little child shall be greatest in the kingdom 
of heaven." Did he make even his favorite disciple a 
chief among his brethren, no such thing ! He rather gave 
in charge to him a heart broken, helpless, yet amiable, 
virtuous, pious and innocent woman : in his dying ago- 
nies and excruciating dissolution. I mean his own dear 
mother. Humility is the nerve of religion while ambi- 
tion is its bane. Yet in all our schools ambition is incul- 
cated upon the juvenile mind, while humility is exploded; 
and this I call the foundation stone of the miseries of 
Christendom. Hence in all ranks of civilized society, 
every one is seeking to circumvent his neighbour, in or- 
der to accumulate riches, and thus gratify this spirit of 
ambition, and if one arose from the dead, he could not 
convince him of the folly, fatality and futility of this pas- 
sion, the natural offspring of a faulty and vain glorious 
education. And so potent, (I had almost said omnipo- 
tent) is this prejudice of education, that it is but seldom 
the most dreadful calamity can obliterate it. Yet cala- 
mity is the last recourse of the heavenly physician, to cure 
this stubborn disorder, and if it fails we must assuredly 
die. Ambition is the parent of a thousand evils, in 
church, in state, and even in the commonwealth of lite- 

E 2 



54 

rature, and the corps of jurisprudence and medical sci- 
ence. I do not wish (because I am predetermined not) 
to cast an imputation, just or unjust, on any sect or party 
or corps, theological, political, medical, or judicial. 
However, I would rejoice to find a law passed in the na- 
tional legislature, appropriating a stipulated salary for all 
attorneys and advocates, as well as judges; as also for the 
genteel support of doctors of medicine. Their salary to 
be the same when they had much as when they had little 
practice ; if this law related to pawn-brokers, and all 
other professions whose prosperity increased in an exact 
ratio, as the pubhcs decreased. I think it would be the 
more valuable. I do not by these remarks wish to in- 
validate these corps, in each of them there are great and 
good men. The medical corps in the city of Philadel- 
phia has produced the greatest and the best of men, and 
when he died I believe he left not his match behind, 
at least not in America : I mean Dr. Benjamin Rush. 

This eulogium is the offspring of disinterested candour 
and veneration for departed worth. His urbanity while 
alive, and his works, moral, philosophical, as well as me- 
dical, now he is dead, bespeak his worth. If there was 
one man in his native city devoid of bigotry, he was the 
man. When I look round this terraqueous globe, par- 
ticularly Christendom, to find such men as Dr. Rush, and 
find so many millions mentally and morally a perfect con- 
trast to him, I am constrained to lay down my pen, and 
exclaim. with a generous poet worthy to be named with 
Dr. Rush : I mean Cowper, 

" Oh, for a lodge in some vast wilderness, 

Some boundless contiguity of shade, 

Where rumour of oppression and deceit. 

Of unsuccessful or successful war, 

Might never reach me more! My ear is pain'd. 

My soul is sick with ev'ry day's report 

Of wrong and outrage with which earth is filPd* 

There is no flesh in man's obdurate heart; 

It does not feel for man. " 

When I intellectually view christian as^*well as Pagan 
countries, and see one part of the human family exalted 
to demigods, and demegogues, and the other part de- 



55 

graded to beggars and beasts of burden ; the one part liv- 
ing in all manner of extravagant sensuality, and the other 
part absolutely dying for want of what they waste, I na- 
turally ask myself, " why is this dreadful disorder per- 
mitted to derange and distress mankind ? But I find an 
answer ready, namely, THEY ARE FREE AGENTS ! ! 
Among the species of lions there is no Nero ; among the 
race of tygers there is no Caligula permitted to arise, and 
systematically tyrannise over the brute creation : and, 
wherefore, because they are unlike man, who is a free 
agent. These verocious animals, with all others of the 
carnaverous kind do not tyrannise, they instantaneously 
slay and eat their victims, of course, end a day of happi- 
ness with a moments pain. The utility of carnaverous 
animals will at once appear obvious, even to those philo- 
sophical unbelievers who wish to find fault with the in- 
finitely wise economy of a gracious providence. Were it 
not for them the earth would be covered, the air would 
be tainted, and the waters would be contaminated with 
putrid carcases of beasts, of birds, of fish. But the ques- 
tion recurs : why was a Nero, a Caligula permitted to 
oppress and tonnent their species ? the answer is still at 
hand : They were produced by moral corruption in the 
people : for it is a fundamental truth, (though I well 
know that not one in a million will believe it such) that 
when an individual, a family, or a nation turn their backs 
on what Socrates used to call his good genii, though some 
sectarians, with sanctimonious countenances, boldly and 
miblushingly assert that he, because a heathen, and in- 
fants, because the unbaptised children of heathens, are 
in hell ; yet Socrates was infinitely their superior in men- 
tal and moral excellencies : I say, when they thus turn 
their backs upon their infallible dictator, upon the 
obvious laws of nature, the dictates of reason, and the 
simple suggestions of common sense, they are ready to 
become the votaries of every absurdity in religion and 
politics, in theory and practice : and the vassals of every 
hypocritical priest and tyrannical potentate; and if such 
servile mortals find nothing but misery when they thus 
turn their backs upon so kind a benefactor, is it not a just 
re-action for their base ingratitude to their best friend, 
and servility, or, if you please, loyalty to their worst foe. 



56 

Let any man, who doubts the authenticity of this asser- 
tion, read the histories of the Asiatic sultans, grand mo- 
guls, nabobs, grand lama, Bramins, priests of Juggernott, 
&c. and then he will doubt no more. Nero and Caligula 
were detestable tyrants, and thousands besides I might 
mention, and not leave Solomon out of the number. Who 
made therft men ? I answer, God. Who made them ty- 
rants ? I answer, men : servile, sycophantic, bigoted men. 
The Israclitish priesthood preached for pay, and divined 
for money. They also preached unconditional submis- 
sion to their kings, which secured their sovereign and tyran- 
nical authority; and who was to blame: no doubt the people, 
themselves " my people love to have it so," says God by 
the mouth of his faithful prophet Jeremiah. When the 
Romans were virtuous, they were free, for God was their 
defender, and no tyrant dared to infringe their rights : 
but alas ! when they became vicious they also became an 
easy prey to every enterprising adventurer. God will 
help them that help themselves, and this assertion is elu- 
cidated in the fable of the wagonner and Jupiter. A bad 
population, like a bad tree, produces bad fruit. Were it not 
for a host of parasites, pensioners, prostitutes, spies, in- 
formers, flatterers, and the hangman at their head, Nero 
would have never reigned ; and were it not for a host of 
such tories and traitors, with pride and ambition at their 
head, France would be now in Europe what the United 
States is in America. *' A lesson to the oppressor, and a 
pattern to the oppressed?'* Cursed ambition ! the bane 
of virgins, and the bait of foois, has destroyed that beau- 
tiful country, which nature has made a paradise and man 
has metamorphosed to a dungeon of despotism and deso- 
lation. When I recollect the commencement and the se- 
quel, the progress and the catastrophe of the French re- 
volution, and the desperate consequences of its failure on 
the liberty, peace, and happiness of the European popu- 
lation, my very heart almost weeps blood. 

God gave the people of France a fair opportunity to 
assert their natural rights, and support thefr political in- 
dependence. Yes, I will contend thai he graciously gave 
them a better chance than any other nation ever were 
blessed with : I will not except the enlightened and in- 
dependent people of America. This God can do with- 



^7 

out acting incompatible with his equitable attributes ; but 
if he could lift them out of the sink of political prostitu- 
tion and religious fanaticism, and set them on their feet 
and enable the nation to stand like a man, and no longer 
crouch and cringe like a beast, he certainly could not 
walk for them, nor be grateful for them ; nor be a terror 
to the royal tyrant, and an asylum to the degraded slave 
for them. God did his part, but they refused to do their 
part — of course, they displayed to the view of men and 
angels, their base and abominable ingratitude, and by 
deeds that more than spoke, they declared that they despis- 
ed the gift of civil liberty with which they were crowned. 
And who can without pain behold the terrible re-action of 
a just and righteous providence, which was the necessary 
result of their detestable ingratitude to their Divine bene- 
factor, who crowned them with liberty and the light of 
political knowledge, and punished them for their servile 
and sycophantic adulation of the demagogues who robbed 
them of these paramount blessings. Bthold this misera- 
ble people plunged again into the dungeon of despotism, 
with torches of political knowledge to see their degrada- 
tion, while their republican tyrants are doomed to perpet- 
ual imprisonment, exile, infamy, or death. Yet there are 
miserable miscreants who will have the impudence to 
blame God only for the mighty calamity under which the 
French population groan : when any idiot, not wilfully 
blind, may clearly see it is the fruit of their own ingrati- 
tude and servility.* 

* In order to prove that God graciously trok the French popu- 
lation out of the sink of political pollution, and graciously made 
the nation stand by holding before their intflltrctual eyes the 
light of political knowledge, I will take the liberty to introduce 
a quotation from my "Preliminary Essay." page 272, which is 
nearly verbatim in my MSS. letter to general Bonaparte, sent to 
him via the A triMican ambassador, Mr Livingston, in the year 
1801, and is word for word in my printed letter, corrected and 
revised, sent to him A. D. 1804, via the French principal secre- 
tary of state, Monsieur Tallev rand. In this quotation the reader 
will recognize that it was not for want of light to see the 
super-inhuman villainy of the d^ed, or tht dreadtul consequences 
rt'suhing from their base and di^b' lical ambition, tha- M. Taf- 
ley and or Bonaparte, or peihajis both subverted, nay, annihila- 
ted the liberties of the French rejjublic- 



58 ' 

It seems that kin^ridden and priest-ridden people canr 
not be content without an idol to worship. Witness the 
ancient Israelites, when delivered from Egyptian bond- 



" Having freely apprised you of your danger in a future world, 
in the event of final inattention to your eternal interests, permit 
me to remind you of your duty and your clanger in a political 
point of view. Have you duly adverted to the genius of that great 
nation over which you now preside ? And are they not, almost to 
^ proverb, jealous of their national rights and liberties? Have 
they not proved to the world, that they are a nation of Brutuses? 
Are they, on this account, to be condemned ? Sarely not. Have 
they sacrificed countless lives, and almost exhausted their trea- 
sures to procure for themselves, and transmit to their posterity, 
their national rights and privileges ; and shall they not be tena- 
cious of them ? The man, or set of men, who despoil them of 
privileges obtained at such infinite expense, literally robs them of 
the vast treasure they expended, and virtually murders the ma- 
ny brave heroes, who sacrificed their lives to purchase liberty for 
their country and their children, and proclaim to the world that 
these keroes fought and bled and died in vain. To imagine that 
the French people will allow themselves to be, with impunity, 
despoiled of their dear-bought privileges, is to suppose them, not 
only without patriotism, honour, and generosity, but without a 
mind and without a memory. Shall they, after the bloody strug- 
gle, transmit to coming generations a despotism so unmanly and 
fatal ? Shall they deposit, in the hands of their progeny, the san- 
guinary sword, all stained with the blood of the patriotic sons of 
France, when a little more courage and perseverance would se- 
cure their liberties? In what contempt and detestation would 
posterity hold them ? Would not their children and their chil- 
dren's children execrate their cowardice, and curse the tyrant 
while rotting in his grave, with his parisitical advisers. All that 
is wanting to render them happy, is perseverance in the vindica- 
tion of their just rights and unalienable privileges. Of vast mag- 
nitude and importance is the cause of liberty. It is not the con- 
cern of a city or a country, it is the concern of Europe, nay, of 
the whole world. It is not the concern of a day, ot a year, or of 
an age; it is equally the concern of the present generation, and of 
many generations to come. Recollect, sir, your political conduct 
may be productive of much happincas or of much misery to many 
millions yet unborn. Figure to yourself your political misconduct 
ipscribed, in very small characters, on a young tree, and the in- 
scription to increase with the tree, in what large characters would 
posterity read your infamous departure from political and moral 
rectitude ? You should always remember, when you are plan- 
ing fot posterity, that neither wisdom, nor virtue, nor honour, 
nor courage, is hereditary. Portentous are the times in which we 
live. Great is the trust deposited in your hands. How many 



59 

age : yet they would have a golden calf to adore. And 
the French republic, when emancipated from royal bond- 
age, nothing would suit them but an imperial bull to bow 



millions are committed to your care ! Many are the vicissitudes 
ot fortune they have already experienced. Manifold difficulties 
have they encountered and escaped. High is the eminence on 
which you now stand. Vast is the prospect before you. Happily 
may yru contribute to the prosperity, or unhappily may you con- 
duce to the misery, of Europe. Inattentive must you be to your 
duty, your interest, and your honour, to the interest and the hon- 
our ot the French nation, if you are not inspired with the most 
laudable ambition and zeal, to secure to them such a free and 
happy government, as they risked their all to obtain. Has not 
the world seen the French nation great in adversity, struggling 
with the difficulties incident to a revolutionary war, amidst the 
intrigues of unprincipled men among themselves, a number of 
whom have met the fate they merited ; and shall they not be 
great in posterity, and continue to defend their rights, as a lioness 
does her cubs .' Immense is the hurt which, by misconduct, you 
may now do. By a virtuous administration, on the contrary, you 
may do more for the interest and honour of the nation, at the 
head of which you now stand, than all your former victories and 
conquests have done. Were not the Lacedemonians, in external 
circumstances, inferior to many of the other states of Greece ; and 
yet, by their virtue and their valour, did they not obtain a pre-emi- 
nence? Have not the most celebrated heroes of antiquity been 
distinguished and famous for their contempt of worldly riches 
and honours ? In what low circumstances were many of the 
most celebrated champions of ancient Rome, such as Fabricons, 
Cincinnatus, Regulus, and others ? And yet those were the times 
in which public, as we'l as private, virtue shown with unrivalled 
lustre. Their poverty, far from being a reproach, added fresh 
laurels to their fame. The reason is obvious. It indicated such 
a noble contempt of riches as rendered them superior to all the 
arts of corruption and bribery. In modern times, as well as an- 
cient, public virtue possesses charms which attract attention, and 
add a dignity to nations, which is superior to riches and power ; 
commanding respect where pomp, splendour, and magnificence; 
are despised. The people of France are not ignorant of the ne- 
cessary prerequisites and essential qualifications which constitute 
an upright magistrate or a virtuous government. They know 
that a good magistrate is a friend to the liberties of the people, 
makes their interest his own, and is happy when they are happy. 
Readily can they also recognize when an individual tyrant, or a 
government of them, deviates from the path of rectitude ; pros- 
tituting their consciences aad their power to the most unworthy 
purposes. A nation, delivered from local prepossessions and 
sentimental prejudices, sees with new eyes, and hears with new 



60 

before. Some will boldly assert, that such is their tem- 
perament and volatility that they cannot live only under 
a military or hereditary despotism : if this is a fact, they 
are certainly inferior to the brute creation. 



ears. Curious, as well as contaminating, is prejudice; accom- 
modating itself to all the propensities and passions of the human 
mind. In what mind, noble or ignoble, learned or illiterate, does 
it not find a residence ? What mind is not, in a greater or less 
degree, under the influence of political or religi'^us prejudice ? 
Like the spider, it can fix its residence, and live any or every 
where. Let the mind be as empty as the walls of an uninhabit- 
ed dungeon, or polished like the walls of a palace ; let it be 
informed or uninformed, prejudice, if not disturbed, will keep 
possession of it. But when the time arrives at which a political 
revolution is to be accomplished m the state, or a religious in the 
church, prejudice, however obstioate, must yield. The revolu- 
tion which h.Hs taken place in France, in the political sentiments 
of the people, no less than the political state of the country, is, 
doubtless, in all its causes, concomitants, and effects, one of the 
most extraordinary in the annals of the world. Great, indeed, is 
the change in the political sentiments of the B'rench nation. Are 
they as much a^ ever dupes to political ignorance and error ? 
Are they as much as ever liable to the impositions of designing 
men, and enterprising demagogues .? Are they as much an ever 
apt tamely to submit to any tyrant of despot that may wish to 
enslave them ? Or is the mind swept of its former political cob- 
webs, and prepared for the reception of generous poliiical ideas > 
Can they be supposed ever to return to their political ignorance 
and prejudices ? As soon may a scholar totally forget his alpha- 
bet, or a wise man become an idiot. Can the minvl once duly in- 
formed become uninformed, or unknow what it knows? Apt 
indeed are vulgar minds to be dazzled with the sple^fdour of 
courts. But often are the despotic actions, and enormous expen- 
ses of the latter, the means of undeceiving the former, and the 
veil of ignorance, when once torn, can never be repaired, as ig- 
norance is only the absence of knowledge ; it is obvious, that 
though a maw may be kept ignorant, he cannot be made igno- 
rant. 

Let me, in a particular manner, inculcate on your mind one 
momentous truth. It is this— notwith ;tanding appearance* to 
the contrary, there is not a description of men, that more clearly 
see your danger, or more heartily despise your conduct, in the 
event of its proving unhappily desp. tic, than those very charac- 
ters of the diplomatic, s^^natorial and judical departments, who 
now daily surround and flatter you. Interest obliges then to 
wish you to oppress the people ; because t'ley expect ihem to 
fennch themselves at the expense of the public. In the event of 



61 

The species of lions, tigers, bears, and crocodiles have 
no Nero's, Caligula's, Dionysius's, or Robespiere's, 
among them ; and wherefore ? because they listen to and 



your acting the basest part, self-interest would incline them to 
approve and eulogize your conduct. Sensible are they, that if 
you could see your danger as they see it, your govornment might 
speedily come to an end, and they would lose their places and 
pensions. But well do they know, that if you infringe the privi- 
leges of the people, your head will not be out of danger ; but while 
you keep your head upon your shoulders, they wish to keep their 
lucrative, places like the flatterers of Robespierre, and his prema- 
ture and ignominious death, will prove the authenticity of my as- 
sertion. You certainly cannot have forgot the tragical end of 
this sanguinary monster that, for a time, ruled the French nation ; 
■who received a thousand addresses and congratulations, filled 
vf'vh the most fulsome flattery, on his escaping a supposed plot 
for his assassination. And you cannot but remember what hap- 
pened about one month after. He was brought to the scaifold ; 
and, for the very great service they had done to society, by extir- 
pating such a moaster from the earth, his executioners received 
upwards of fifteen hundred addresses of thanks from the people. 
But to shew, beyond a doubt, that the French nation know what 
their chief magistrate is, or ought to be, I will here transcribe 
that declaration of the rights of man, which was made the basis 
of the new constitution, and which, by order of the national con- 
vention, was circulated throughout France, at the commence- 
ment of the revolution. It runs thus :— 

DECLARATION OF THE RIGHTS OF MAN AND OF CITIZENS 

By the National Assembly of France, 

* The representatives of the people of France, formed into a 
National Assembly, considering that ignorance, neglect, or con- 
tempt of human rights, are the sole causes of public misfortunes 
and corruptions of government, have resolved to set forth, in a 
solemn declaration, these natural, imprescriptible, and alienable 
rights: That this declaration being constantly present to the 
minds of the members of the body social, they may be ever kept 
attentive to their rights and their duties : That the acts of the 
legislature and executive powers of government, being capable of 
being every moment compared with the end of political institu- 
tutions, may be more respected ; and also, that the future claims 
of the citizens, being directed by simple and incontcstiblc princi- 
ples, may always tend to the maintenance of the constitution, and 
the general happiness. 

* For these reasons the National Assembly doth recognize aad 
declare, in the presence of the Supreme Being, and with tlie hope 



62 

obey the laws of nature. But man, with all his boasted 
knowledge, destroys his own happiness by disobeying thfi 
laws of nature, and forthwith manufactures a host of ty- 



of his blessing and favour, the following sacred rights of men and 
of citizens: 

* I. Men are born, and always continue free and equal in res- 
pect of their rights. Civil distinctions, therefore, can be founded 
only on public utility. 

* II. Tlie end of all political associations is the preservation of 
the natural and imprescriptible rights of man ; anc-l these rights 
are liberty, property, security, and resistance of oppression. 

* III. The nation is essentially the snurxe of all sovereignty ; 
nor can any individual, or any body of men, be entitled to any au- 
thority which is not expressly derived from it. 

* IV. Political liberty consists in the power of doing whatever 
does not injure another. The exercise of the natural rights of 
every man, has no other limits than those which are necessary to 
secure to every other man the free exercise of the same rights ; 
and these limits are determinable only by the law. 

* V. The law ought to prohibit only actions hurtful to society. 
What is not prohibited by the law, should not be hindered ; nof 
should any one be compelled to that which the law does not re- 
quire. 

* VI. The law is an expression of the will of the commuiiity. 
All citizens have a right to concur, either personally, or by their 
representatives in its formation. It should be the same to all 
whether it protects or punishes ; and all being equal in its sight. 
are equally eligible to all honours, places, and employments, ac- 
cording to their diiferent abilities, without any other distinction 
than that created by their virtues and talents. 

* VII. No man should be accused, arrested, or held in confine- 
ment, except in cases determined by the law, and according to 
the forms which it has prescribed. AH who promote, sdicit, ex- 
ecute, or cause to be executed, arbitrary orders, ought to be pun 
ished ; and every citizen called upon, or apprehended by virtue 
of the law, ought immediately to obey, and renders himself cul- 
pable by resistance. 

* VIII. The law ought to impose no other penalties than such 
as are absolutely and evidently necessary : and no one ought to be 
punished, but in virtue of a law promulgated before the offence, 
and legally applied. 

* IX. Every man being presumed innocent till he has been con- 
victed, whenever his detention becomes indispensible, all rigour 
to him, more than is necessary to secure his person, ought to be 
provided against by the law. 

* X. No man ought to be molested on account of his opinions, 
not even on account of his religious opinions, provided his avowal 
of them does not disturb the public order established by law. 



63 

rants, who grievously oppress him. And is it not a just 
re-action of Divine providence, for his base ingratitude in 
refusing to pay homage to God, the author of all his mer- 



*XI. The unrestrained comnnunication ot thoughts and opinions 
being one of the nnost precious rights of man, every citizen may 
speak, write, and publish freely, provided he is responsible for 
the abuse of this liberty in cases determined by the law. 

* XII. A public force being necessary to give security to the 
rights of men^nd of citizens, that force is instituted for the be- 
nefit of the community, and not for the benefit of the persons with 
whom it is entrusted. 

* XIII. A common contribution being necessary for the support 
of the public force, and for defraying the other expenses of gov- 
ernment, it ought to be divided equally among the members of 
the community, according t® their abilities. 

'XIV. Every citizen has a right, either by himself or his re- 
presentative, to a free voice in determining the necessity of public 
contribution, the appropriation of them, and their amount, mode of 
assessment, and duration. 

* XV. Every community has a right to demand of all its agents, 
an account of their conduct. 

* XVI, Every community in which a separation of powers and 
a security of rights is not provided for, wants a constitution. 

* XVII. The right to property being inviolable and sacred, no 
one ought to be deprived of it, except in cases of evident public 
necessity legally ascertained, and on condition of a previous just 
indemnity.* 

** Whether your future official conduct shall accomplish or dis- 
appoint the expectations of the friends of liberty, it is certain that 
such a government as is here recommended, may exist, nay, has, 
in fact, existed, both in theory and practice, for a number of years. 
That nations, populous, and inhabiting countries of great extent, 
may be, if they will, free and happy ; here is an irrefragable 
proof. Here, in the Uiiited States of America, are persons of all 
nations, and of all languages, who brought their prepossessions 
and prejudices, propensities, and passions with them ; who, not- 
withstanding, live in harmony and friendship. Neither can the 
poor be said to be oppressed here, nor the rich pampered. The 
dfferent departments of government are established and support- 
ed on principles of economy, rather than extravagance. Here 
no provision is made for a despot to live in magnificence and 
splendour, at the expense of the poor, as well as the rich; the 
mechanical, as well as the mercantile parts of society Neither 
our executive, nor onr legislative bodies, have any occasion for 
guards, to protect them from an infuriated populace. Where 
such defence is necess.-.ry, it unavoidably occasions a suspicion 
that some fatal source of public discontent exists, from which the 
necessity of u j^roceeds. And unhappy, indeed, is the man, whe- 



64 

cies ? Without any manner of doubt. The fact is, when 
man individually or eollectively, in political or religious 
societies, turn their backs upon nature, and lend a deaf 
ear to. the intellectual voice of the Spirit of truth, it is 
innpossible to calculate to what excess they may run, in- 
to all manner of religious and political absurdity ; I 
should rather have said, religious fanaticism and political 
intolerance. 



iher called a consul or a constable, who is obnox^us to the ven- 
geance of a nation on account of his tyranny. The inimitable 
general and patriotic statesman,* who lives, and will for ever 
live in the afF-ction of the people of America, and to whom, un- 
der God, we are indebted for the independence, liberty, and 
prosperity we now enjoy, permit me to repeat the sentimei)t, 

WHAT A NOBLE PATTERN FOa YOU TO IMITATE!! After 

his example, consecrate your fame ; give to France a well-ad- 
justed and righily-organized constitution ; a constitution which, 
adapted to the character and local circumstances of the nation, 
shall establish their prosperity on the soUd principles of liberty 
and good order. This once accomplished, her acquisitions will 
form the basis of substantial greatness ; but, if otherwise, they 
■will fly away like the painted, but unsubstantial, forms of a magi- 
cal lanthorn. 

Is not France now, in a particular manner, the object of the 
jealousy^ of the other European powers ? The states, at whose 
expense she has been aggrandized, will not be easily reconciled 
to her; but will, ^ith impatience, watch the moment of retalia- 
tion. Should France be cursed with a distracted government, or, 
which is worse still, a military or a hereditary despotism, which 
God forbid ! opportunities will not be wanting. The friends of 
France have considered the late revolution as the most glorious 
epoch in its history, and the most consoling presage of its fu- 
ture greatness. But remember, sir, its future happiness depends, 
jn a great measure, on your official ctrnduct, particularly the rec- 
titude of your heart, and the purity of your intentions. 

** If your administration shall unhappily prove to be incompa- 
tible with the political principles which you and the French na- 
tion profess, and repugnant to the character of a just ruler, a 
good citizen, and an honest man ; if it shall eventually encroach 
upon the natural rights of man, as man, particularly that most 
valuable of all rights, and most sacred of all property, liberty of 
conscience, what must the necessary consequence be ? It will 
not only exhibit yo\ir poliiical hyfiocrisy with a witness, and your 
systematic villainy without disguise, BUT WILL ASSUREDLY 
PROVE A ^RELUDE TO YOUR RUIN."t 

* General George Washington. 

f Alas ! haw wofully has the above prediclion, made fourteen years ag^, 
—been fulfilled. 



65 

The ease with which the humau mind may be led from 
the source of its happiness to the source of its misery ; 
I have viewed with astonishment and grief. An associ- 
ation of bad politicians or religionists might metamor- 
phose the children of the most independent people, 
to slavish worshipers of the great mogul, or the grand 
lama. But what is the cause ; they abuse the gift of God 
by prostituting their reason and common sense, in the ser- 
vice of their mortal tyrants, to the neglect of their im- 
mortal benefactor. And a curse attends the unnatural 
innovation. 

This must be a fact let who will deny it. When a 
man reads in the book of creation this important text, 
*' Itarn from viy kindness to you all^ to be kind to one 
another p^ and the same day vindicates and defends the 
political and ecclesiastical tyrants, who degrade and tor- 
ment their own species : is not the conduct of this man 
an insult to reason and common sense, and is not his own 
misery a just re-action for his hypocritical and tyranical 
servility. Yet alas, what is called civilized and chris- 
tianized society, presents millions of such instances. In- 
deed so very corrupt are all ranks in civilized as well as 
savage life, that none but those who take their intellectual 
eyes from man, and place them upon the works and 
words of God, and no longer listen to his syren voice, 
but rather to the voice of the holy spirit, can be able to 
distinguish between truth and error. 

The people of France no doubt heard with admiration, 
the well known fact, that Gen. Washington fought for his 
country in the field, and presided in the cabinet for manv 
years ; and so far from circumventing the mouth of labour, 
or enriching himself therewith, he would not receive any 
pecuniary emolument for his important services. Yet 
the same people subsequently beheld with a criminal apa- 
thy. General Bonaparte subvert their republic, and pur- 
loin from the national purse, more money for the splen- 
did decoration of himself, and his first and second wife, 
than would maintain the government of the United States 
twenty years ; while at the same time many of his fellow 
citizens, who were his equals in mental, and his superiors 
in moral excellence, were perishing for want of the ne- 
cessaries of life. Nature encompasses man with abun- 

r 2 



66 

dance, yet we see him die for want ; and wherefore ? be- 
cause as in the above instance he acts in opposition, and 
not in subordination to the laws of nature. He, the op- 
pressed winks at the villiany of his oppressors, and of 
course becomes doubly guilty j^br he who allows oppres- 
sion shares the crime : excuse the tautology. If therefore 
an individual villian, or a government of them, rules 
any nation, with despotic power it is the people who suf- 
fer, and who are to blame. Yet view the most polished 
societies, for in my view, the more polished, the more 
corrupt they generally are. See one part, the rich and 
powerful few, circumventing the poor, and helpless, 
many, of even the necessaries of life. The first are cloy- 
ed with superabundance, the last perish for want. 

These polished people have visited many parts of the 
earth, which they did not cultivate, but few places but 
what they polluted with the blood of their species. It 
would certainly take a larger book than the Bible to con- 
tain a description of the extravagant pride and sensuality 
of one part of the population of Europe, and the degra- 
dation and starvation of the other part. One part are ex- 
alted above the state of man, the other are degraded be- 
low the state of brutes. Thus the laws of nature are 
enervated, and a curse attends the inversion, for the rich 
are cloyed with abundance, until they cannot enjoy it : 
while the poor are perishing for want of their portion of 
these necessaries of life. Yet they all profess to be led 
by not reason alone, but also by religion, and the most 
profound erudition and polite literature. But alas, every 
religious and political association have a reason of their 
own. Many religious societies have also a physiology 
of their own, as well as a peculiarity of manners, customs, 
and forms of religion, and apparel different from all 
others. Yet they all think their own form is the best. 
And this pride of opinion is the parent of bigotry, which 
formerly kindled the fires in which the martyrs were 
consumed ; and to the present moment is a partition wall 
to separate the members of the same family, who were 
ordained by nature to live in the most perfect union, re- 
ciprocal friendship, and social intercourse. Yet they all 
and each of them, will say they can give you reason, and 
also scripture, chapter and verse ; for their diversifi<ed 



0/ 

lorms and ceremonies, though often as ciiflt'rent from 
each other as light is from darkness. When the source 
of truth appeared among the Jews, and Preached his ce- 
lestial gospel, the Scribes and pharisees professed the 
highest degree of religion, and could no doubt produce 
what they called reason and revelation in support of it ; 
yet their cruel malice and malicious cruelty, which even- 
^tuated in the crucifixion of our dear and merciful Re- 
deemer, clearly demonstrated then what kind of religion 
they possessed, the same as the roasting a heretic alive 
with a slow fire, by the officers of the inquisition, now 
clearly shows what kind of religion they possess. But 
though the catholics still support the Inquisition ! is re- 
religious persecution confined to them ? by no means : 
In every sect there are proud and tyrannical dicta- 
tors,who have martyred their thousands in the name 
of God and religion. And as they grow rich and pow- 
erful, they become more proud and intolerent in an ex- 
act ratio. And it is as difficult to disperse the clouds of 
ignorance and error from their minds, as it was from 
the minds of the ancient Jews, who lived and died the 
victims of a fatal delusion, crying peace, peace, when 
swift destruction was coming upon them. Witness 
the sack of Jerusalem by Titus, 40 years after the 
death of Christ. While putting down these simplified 
thoughts, for the comfort and contemplation of the des- 
perate child of misfortune, fresh calamities have been 
thickening around myself; which has been a considerable 
hindrance to me. I have perhaps an hundred times taken 
up my pen, in order to put down thoughts which struck 
my mind in justification of the ways of God to such un- 
fortunate mortals as myself, and had to lay it down again 
without being able to accomplish my humane intention. 
Oh, the villiany of man ! I have been plundered oui of 
many thousand dollars, even since I have been in the 
book business, by professors who knowing me to be of 
an easy disposition, have often swindled me out of the 
principle, as well as the profits of my books published by 
myself, amounting to the heaviest end of 100,000 copies: 
This very moment it is impossible for me to express the 
agony and torture of my heart, from the sense I feel of 
the inhumanity of man to myself, and such children of 



63 

misfortune over the whole earth I Yet though I have bcea 
circumvented by man to the loss of a handsome fortune, 
I never appealed to law for justice but once, when insult 
was added to injury; and even then, when I got judg- 
ment against the person, I frankly and freely forgave him 
the whole. By this means I have been reduced to a 
dilemma; but even this teaches me a very important 
truth, namely, that in civil society such men are gene* 
rally reduced to mere cypher's, and often to beggars : while 
the knave, the miser, and the religionist who sold the 
bed from under his sick neighbour, in order to recover 
tke last farthing of his money from him ; these men wath 
the rich booby, whose knowledge consists in low cunning, 
are the demigods of what is called civilized society. I 
have sat up many a night in sorrow, composing or com- 
piling about 5000 pages, for the benefit of my compatri- 
ots ; while I felt often as I do now, like a man running 
to relieve his perishing neighbour, with a fifty six pound 
weight chained round his neck j and what have I reaped 
for my labour of love ? I answer infamy and abuse, 
calumny and imposition. My life threatened by the 
bigoted assassin, and falsely swore against by the religi- 
ous professor. But even this complicated calamity teaches 
me another very important truth ; namely, that I ought to 
believe in, to love, and endeavour to honour God, be- 
neath his frown, as well as beneath his smile. .When 
I am sinking beneath the waves of sorrow, as weU 
as when I am on the mountain top of joy and delight. 

And that there can be no true virtue, but what is 
practised in order to benefit man, from the pure desire of 
pleasing God alone ; and if this can be done incog, or 
without letting the left hand know what the right hapd 
does ; it is still more estimable, far more amiable in the 
sight of heaven ! 

Again, calamity alone has given me clearly to see the 
vanity and futility of regarding the praise or censure of 
man, or rendering myself miserable from the view I have 
of their petulence and perverseness. But the most in- 
teresting truth that calamity has taught me, which is 
itself worth a mountain of gold or a valley of diamonds, 
is this : the author of nature has necessarily placed us on 
this globe as in a tdrrestial paradise, made so by God, but 



69 

chiinged to a dungeon by man ; our residence here must 
needs be circumscribed ; of course, he has graciously sur- 
rounded the honest man with salutary ills, first to wean 
his affections from this transitory and delusive world ; 
and secondly, to reconcile him to the thoughts of disso- 
lution, and render that momenta pleasurable one to him. 
Oh ye children of affliction, this should be a consolatory 
thought to you ; it is in unison with the sentiments of St. 
Paul ? " Them that I love I chastise, and rebuke every 
son that I receive." Humble yourselves therefore be- 
neath his merciful chastisement, for unless you do, it must 
all prove abortive. As calamity is the last recourse of 
heaven, to recall the frail sons of earth to their own hap- 
piness. If Blair said, 

" How shocking must thy summons be, Oh death, 
To him that is at ease in his possessions," 

I will say, 

How joyful must thy summons be, Oh deaths 
To him who loves his God, the' full of grief ; 
Beset with ills, and covered with misfortune. 

1 have been led to make a contrast in my own mind, 
between civilized and savage society, by reflecting upon the 
exertions of our Missionary and Mite Societies. Before 
we make this interesting contrast, it will be proper to give 
a brief view of the different modes of education, used by 
these different societies : my reason for dwelling so much 
upon our corrupt though popular mode of education, is 
this : I consider it the source from whence proceeds all 
our miseries, individual, domestic, and national, which if 
fully delineated, a thousand volumes would not contain 
the dreadful deliniation. It is a certain fact that chil- 
dren may be taught by early education, any error or any 
truth, or indeed any religion, manners and habits ; even 
though contrary to the laws of nature. 

How necessary then is it to correct the present abomi- 
nable mode of education, and to substitute abetter in its 
room ! Is it not a sin that cries to heaven for vengeance, 
against those who see the evil, and have it in their power 
to remedy it, .and yet do not use that power tp remedy 



70 

evils, so fatal, so dreadful, so profound. The royal oak 
when a twig may receive any bend, and the brick when 
clay may receive any form ; so is it with educating our 
youth. The first lesson taught by parent and preceptor, 
by example is cruelty. Mr. Jefferson says " children 
are imitative animals." The master at school and the 
mother at home, with whip in hand, both act the tyrant. 
The children must therefore learn by the sense of feel- 
ing, as well as seeing. The second lesson is ambition, 
this is inculcated by threats, by promises, by classical ad- 
vancement, and by the hope of a silver medal. 

When civil and christian education so called, is such, 
is it not abominable injustice, to hang one man, and gib- 
bet another ; who only act according to the principles dic- 
tated by this mode of society. If the present system of edu- 
cation is the parent of crime, is it not the indispensible duty 
of them, who have it in their power, to correct this delete- 
rious mode, without defalcation. The man who has been 
frustrated in his ambitious arrangements to make his for- 
tune, by legal swindling : such as fraudful speculation, 
shaving notes, enormous usury, the banking system push- 
ed to an extreme, &c. Sec. ; so powerful are first impres- 
sions, and the prejudice of education, that he uses un- 
lawful means to accomplish his object, by forgery, by 
robbery by murder, &c. This is the cause of the prema- 
ture and violent deaths of many thousands in Christendom 
every year. I do contend that there can be no real hap- 
piness, but what ultimately tend either directly or indi- 
rectly, to promote the happiness of mankind. If this 
is a fundamental truth, our present and most perfect mode 
of civilized and christianized society, is corrupt, totally 
corrupt to its very source. Hence we see all ranks 
and grades in civil society, in full pursuit after riches 
Virhich will enal)le them to attain the highest pinnacle of 
grandeur. Of course we see in church and state, all 
people and parties are endeavouring to outvie each other, 
in outward decorations and equipages, to the total ne- 
glect of the inward ornament of a philanthropic and pa- 
triotic heapt. Yet every body knows because daily ex- 
perience demonstrates the melancholy fact : that wealth 
without charity is misery most profound. Man was or- 
dained by nature, to progress from imbecility and ignor- 



ance, to intelligence and social intercourse ; but what is 
the fact, as it relates to civil society. It is this ; that 
man so far from considering that his individual happiness 
consists in promoting the happiness of his fellow creatures, 
of all kinds, kindreds and colours ; he necessarily consi- 
ders because he has been always taught so, that his hap- 
piness consists not in virtue or the promoting the hap- 
piness of others ; but rather in accumulating a fortune, 
building a palace, and outshining all others in elegance 
and splendour. I am truly sorry I cannot find language 
to depicture in living colours, the mountains of mischief 
and misery produced, particularly in civil society, by this 
fatal deviation from the plain laws of nature and the sim- 
ple dictates of common sense. The order of nature is 
subverted, and a curse attends the subversion ! Witness 
the palaces and prisons in christian cities, the abodes of 
extravagant sensuality, and want and misery: one part 
cloyed with superabundance and the other part literally per- 
ishing with hunger. The few are seeking their happi- 
ness in vain show, in pomp and pride, the foolish titles 
of royalty, and the useless tinsel of superstition ; and in 
so [doing rob the many, of the necessaries of life, and 
doom them to degradation, starvation, and desperation : 
and then forsooth execute them by thousands, for doing 
what society collectively first teaches, and then individu- 
ally compels them to do. Religion, matrimony, politics, 
genius, the arts and sciences, are all prostituted to gain 
riches. And if one intelligent child of nature will refuse 
to go down with the general torrent of moral corruption: 
infamy, disgrace, and poverty, must be his portion. Was 
he worth thousands this year, the next he would be a beg- 
gar. 

Indeed many of our boasted laws are so absurd in their 
nature, and so great an insult to common sense in their 
tendency, that the most ignorant of our own population 
cannot help seeing their injustice, their mighty prejudice 
to the contrary notwithstanding. How cruel, how absurd, 
how wicked, to punish the crimes in manhood which we 
ourselves inculcated in infancy. What a dreadful out- 
rage on common honesty, that the tender philanthropist, 
who, by his conduct, adorned human nature, should- for 
his virtue, be doomed himself to beggary, and his poor 



- 72 

children cast as lambs' among wild beasts— carted to the 
poor house — there corrupted, and soon after hung for 
stealing the value of a few shillings, which starvation per- 
haps compelled them to. While, on the other hand, the 
fraudful speculator, who, from pure avarice and not from 
want, robbed his neighbours of millions, is first made a 
magistrate, (for what won't money make) then an alder- 
man, and, lastly, a chief justice, who rides in his superb 
coach and four horses, while his philanthropic neighbour 
we have just mentioned is reduced to beg, propped on his 
staff, and shaking as he goes, a morsel of bread, with a 
lame leg, a hungry belly, and a breaking heart ; while his 
poor children, O ! dreadful thought, are sentenced to an 
ignominious death by this very judge, who gained his 
wealth and weight in a most corrupt society by vice, 
while the intelligent philanthropist is brought to starva- 
tion for attending to the opposite virtue, and, of course, 
violating the wicked laws of christianized man. Those 
who laugh at this true, though tragical delineation, I 
would to heaven they would be compelled to visit our 
prisons, poor houses, and brothels, in America as well as 
Europe, and examine individually their wretched in- 
mates relative to their misfortunes, their vices, and their 
connections, their true and tragic tales would unfold more 
of the corruptions of our civil society than it would be 
prudent for me to delineate, however true I could prove 
my delineation to be. The fact is, Icould say and prove a 
great deal in support of my glimpse of popular depravity, 
which would implicate many respectable corps, political 
and ecclesiastical ; but by thus saying what might be said 
with the strictest truth, I would subvert my own prima- 
ry object, namely, benefiting my fellow creatures with 
the pure motive of pleasing my Creator alone. I j:an 
speak with more confidence on this subject than many 
others, from this consideration, that I have travelled much, 
as I have already mentioned ; and also, when I was a sec- 
tarian preacher 1 regularly preached in prisons and poor 
houses, and, in so doing, heard the tales of wo that would 
make the heart of a midnight assassin, though made of 
stone, almost weep tears of blood. 

Look at the superb streets of palaces, in one part of aur 
cities where thousands die of indolence and luxury, and 



then turn your eyes to another part of them, and you will 
see millions in stinking lanes, and alleys, perishing for 
want : I saw myself, a poor widow and her daughter, 
one cold winter's morning, in a corner of a miserable 
room, laying upon the floor ; their bed and covering was 
a piece of an old carpet, which was sprinkled over with 
snow, as well as the whole room, as there was not a pane 
of glass in the windows, nor fuel, nor furniture, nor food 
in this wretched habitation, though it was within a pistol 
shot of the pompous and luxuriant abodes of the sons 
and daughters of extravagant sensuality. 

Among the savages with whom I have been, their chil- 
dren were always raised without stripes, and almost with- 
out a frown ; their wants, being natural, were few ; their 
education was simple, namely, humility and obedience. 
I recollect when I was 17 years of age, I happened to be 
among savages not totally corrupted by the sons of civili- 
zation ; they were in a large circular pavillion, the roof 
of which was the spreading branches of palm trees, which 
were planted in an exact circle, and very close to each 
other, which formed at once a simple, romantic, and cool- 
ing retreat. Here the chiefs were assembled, with their 
usual hospitality, to regale us with palm wine; there was 
but one white man who sat and drank with the chiefs ; 
but for my part I had to kneel down at their feet, as their 
own children did ; thus I partook of their pleasant bever- 
age. I mention this to shew how children may be taught 
humility without cruel chastisements. The parents are 
affectionate, their children are filial. They are taught by 
times to plant some simple roots, to gather the sponta- 
neous fruits with which the woodlands abound ; as also 
to hunt, fish, &c. These simple occupations supply their 
few and simple wants ; and the children as naturally and 
regularly provide for their parents, in their old age, as 
they did before for them in their infancy. The want of 
filial or fraternal love or hospitality, so common among 
civil and polished society, is never to be seen among 
them. I will not except even the barbarians who devour 
human flesh ; even this, the lowest and most degraded of 
savage society, is less pregnant with misery and mischief 
than some of our most highly extolled civil societies. 
For instance, whether is it most cruel to behold helpless 



74 

old age and infancy absolutely and literally enduring thq 
lingering and tormenting pains of death by starvation, foi 
no offence? or men and women roasting in the slow fires of 
the inquisition for not believing a lie ? or the patriot en- 
, during the tortures of the rack for opposing the cruel go- 
vernment of his most Christian majesty ? or the philan 
thropist enduring the lingering pains of death in a dun- 
geon for advocating injured innocence, and vindicating 
the rights of man by his pen ? or the sanguine, but, alas, 
imprudent champion of civil liberty, who is buried alive 
in a gibbet for the unpardonable crime of what his chris- 
tian tyrant calls high treason ? 

These are only a small specimen of the blessings of 
Christian society, and the tender mercies of Christian po- 
tentates. Now which, I would ask, is most cruel, the con- 
duct of the most barbarous part of savage society, I mean 
cannibals, vi^ho kill instantaneously and then devour their 
prisoners of war, or the conduct of the societies I have gi- 
ven a glimps3 of? Common sense and common candour 
will answer the interrogation. Let any man read captain 
Wilson's account of the Pelew islands, in order to see the 
most favourable view of savage society, when totally un- 
contaminated by civilized and christianized man, and 
then the contrast will appear most glaring between civil 
and savage society. 

There are institutions formed in our cities for the pur- 
pose of collecting funds for civilizing and christianizing 
the Asiatics ; as also, for the support of the ministers of 
religion. Yet, alas, while they were accumulating money 
for the conversion and tuition of the heathens, their own 
near neighbours, young and old, were absolutely perish- 
ing with hunger and cold. What a sight is this for kind 
heaven to behold, the professors of religion passing and 
fe-passing the doors of their perishing, starving neigh- 
bours, to deposit in their mite societies their contribu- 
tions for civilizing and christianizing the heathen, 13,000 
miles distant, while they brush with their silk and sattin 
gowns the very doors of their poor, unhappy, perishing 
countrymen, as they pass along, without entering the 
abodes of misery, giving a cent, or dropping a sympathe- 
tic tear over the disconsolate children of misfortune, the 
natural Qffspring of our boasted civilized society. Mil- 



75 

•ions of money have been collected and expended for con- 
verting the Asiatics. Now let us, for a moment, can- 
didly examine the event resulting from this profuse ex- 
penditure. I would first observe, that if mountains of 
gold and vallies of diamonds were expended for the real 
conversion of one soul from heathenish superstition to 
the faith of the Gospel, and true Christian charity, I 
would consider the sacred boon as cheaply bought. But 
I fear this is not the case. Let any candid man read an 
account of the inhabitants of the East and West Indies, 
after their intercourse with the European christians, and 
he will see a picture of cruelty, of avarice, and of murder 
which will astonish him. Many of those who embraced 
the Christian belief were slaughtered, as well as those 
who had not. 

There is an equality, an equilibrium, in the manners 
and habits of savages, even in their most corrupt state, 
which is annihilated too soon after they become civilized 
and christianized. All the difference I could see in the 
habitation of the African king and the house of one of his 
meanest subjects, was only in the dimensions ; both were 
made for convenience, and without ornaments. The food 
and drink of both were also of the same quality. Every 
family had one house and lot of land to cultivate, and no 
more. There filial, fraternal, and parental love, as well 
as hospitality, was admirable. One man had not the 
mortification to behold his neighbour, a poor sordid boo- 
by, possess one hundred houses, while he had not one to 
shelter him from the storm ; nor the vexation to be sen- 
sible that he had many thousand bushels of corn in his 
barn, while he was perishing with hunger, though far his 
superior in mental and moral excellence. 

We will pass over, with an astonished silence, the de- 
struction and devastation which marked the footsteps of 
the Christian soldiers, when they attended or followed 
the Christian missionaries. We will only suppose that 
the preachers of the Gospel sail for the Pelew Islands ; 
they find them a simple, innocent, hospitable, affectionate 
people, with one principal fault, I mean cruelty to their 
enemies who at are open war with them. Their wants are 
few, and plentifully supplied by nature, all unnecessary, 
or, at least, expensive decorations of person and habitation 



7a 

being totally exploded. We will suppose, for the sake of 
illustration, that the Christian missionaries arrive— they 
preach with success the Calyinistic doctrine — the people 
forego their absurd notions of religion and embrace the 
true Christian theology : the work of civilizing will, of 
course, go hand-in-hand with that of christianizing — in a 
few years families of artizans will arrive in the settlement 
— ^the ministers must have fine brick, instead of bamboo 
houses, built for their accommodation — the people, who 
before were happy with the necessaries of life, now be- _ 
gin to nurture a desire for fine houses, fine furniture, fine 
food, fine clothes, &c. &c. soon the land will be monop- 
olized by speculators — then by degrees the . cunning hy- 
pocrite will add house to house, and field to fi.eld, and 
become very rich, build himself a palace, others v/ill im- 
itate him, and they will become by degrees in miniature 
what Paris is in magnitude. All the former order, in- 
nocence, hospitality, and equality, is done away, and ava- 
rice, grandeur, and oppression, is introduced in their 
room, and all this without the aid of a single Christian 
soldier. But if a ship load of Armenian ministers should 
arrive, it will make bad worse by dividing the people in 
opinion and afl:ection, and lead the intelligent part of ^ 
them to doubtful disputations, which will destroy all har- 
mony and social intercourse, engender strife, and eventu- 
ally produce bigotry, which can only be equalled by mil- 
itary despotism. And even this last scourge of man would 
no doubt, crown the efforts of these missionaries, when 
the colony became sufficiently rich and extensive, to justify 
George the III. by the grace of God, king of Great Bri- 
tain and Ireland, defender of the faith, in sending a gov- 
ernor and his suit to this growing settlement, to take pos- 
session of it and build a garrison. This is far from being 
speculative reasoning ; millions of East and West In- 
dians have been bereaved of their little property, liberty, 
and their lives, by Christian priests and soldiers, under 
the banners of the cross. 

There are thousands of temptations to vice, and vice 
of the most pernicious kind, in civil society which sava^ 
ges are unacquainted with, and motives which naturally 
stimulate the latter to the practice of virtue, totally annihi- 
ted by the tyranny of custom among the former. I know 



77 

these simple natural truths will be looked upon by our 
scientific scribes and Pharisees, i. e, our D. D's. and 
L.. L. D's. with the side glance of contemptuous disre- 
gard, or, with their usual haughtiness, they will affect to 
despise what they cannot controvert. The corruptions of 
civil society, which I deprecate, and merely give a 
glimpse of herein, as I would exhibit a drop from the 
full bucket of liquid poison, as a specimen of its viru- 
lence. I say these corruptions are their summum bonum ; 
were it not for them, they would have to apply their own 
hands to useful and healthful labour instead of living in ele- 
gant idleness on the labour, and trampling on the rights of 
mankind. Billions of money is expended ever)'^ year for the 
punishment of crimes ; not a penny for the reformation of 
the poor unfortunate criminals who are driven to despera- 
tion by the disorders of society, of which they are the vic- 
tims. The properequilibrium of civilization being destroy- 
ed, the few are, of course, exalted above the state of man, 
and supported in that state of useless and deleterious 
grandeur, by wicked customs and by wicked laws ; the 
necessary consequence of which is, that many are plunged 
into misery most profound, which unavoidably produces 
crime, and that crime is punished by death. One man by 
the most deleterious villainy, fraudful speculation, low 
cunning, downright lying, and every species of deception, 
accumulates an immense fortune, and rides in his superb 
carriage, while his honest neighbour has to walk upon 
crutches ; and if this noblest work of nature, this poor 
honest man, who despises a pitiful and mean action, is re- 
duced to want, he must starve or steal ; if he considers 
the last of these two evils the least, and steals the value 
of the rope capable of hanging him, he is, forthwith, ex- 
ecuted on a gallows, as thousands are every week in our 
boasted Christendom ; while, at tlie same moment, the 
royal or imperial villain, who robs the public of mil- 
lions, is exalted, not to the gallows, but to the highest pin- 
nacle of human grandeur. The fact is, the laws of civil- 
ized man are so diametrically opposite to the laws of na- 
ture, that it is absolutely impossible for a man to obey 
the dictates of the religion of nature, much less the reli- 
gion of revelation, without certain temjoriil ruin to him- 
self and family, if he has one. This is a bold assertion ; 

e 2 



78 

but I think I can demonstrate its authenticity, viz. al- 
though our celebrated D. D's. arrayed in Sacerdotal silk 
and cambric, have rendered revealed religion, by their 
millions of books and billions of sermons, the most mys- 
terious thing in the world, it is self-evident to me, that 
both natural, as well as revealed religion, are the most 
simple things in nature ; or, if I may be allowed the com- 
parison, they are just like their Divine author, at once 
most simple and most sublime, most ancient and most 
new. Their fundamental duties may be comprised in a 
few words, viz : Love God above all things, for he has 
always loved you, and prove the sincerity of your love to 
him by loving your neighbour as yourself, and being 
kind to him, as God is kind to you, and always do unto 
him as you would wish he should do unto you. These 
dutiies are obligatory on all mankind, civil and savage, at 
all times, in all places, and upon all occasions. Now the 
true lover of God, and sincere admirer of the sovereign 
beauty, cannot, without disobeying this golden rule and 
the intellectual monitor who inculcates it, refuse to con- 
tribute his quota for the relief of a suffering child of af- 
fliction, should he possess only one dollar on earth. 
Again, non-resistance and kindness to enemies is partic- 
ularly inculcated by the good spirit, as the most excellent 
virtue. Now he who obeys, literally obeys, these amiable 
duties, if rich, he will become poor ; if he is poor, he will 
be kept so : because every sharper is watching an oppor- 
tunity to cheat him, when he knows he can do it with im- 
punity, and every fraudful mendicant is always ready to 
impose upon his good nature. Poverty, in the best of 
times, and starvation in the worse, must be his portion. 
This is, alas, far from speculative reasoning ; too, too 
many, of the flowers of civil society, who stemmed the 
torrent of our corrupt manners, have been brought to beg- 
gary and a premature death, the martyrs of popular de- 
generacy. 

I know a man myself, the most liberal, generous, and 
intelligent that I ever knew, who possessed, a few years 
ago, a clear patrimonial fortune of 40,000 dollars — he has 
been always industrious and economical, yet both the 
fruit of his industry and his fortune has been swept away 
by the votaries of corruption, and he is now reduced to 



79 

the most distressing pecuniary embarrasments. Now he 
is poor, he is slighted ; while fraiidfui h peculators, who 
accumulated large fortunes, partly by imposing upon the 
generous disposition of this amiable child of nature, this 
honest man, the noblest work of God, are fawned upon 
and flattered by the sycophantic votaries of mammon. 
Alas, how many such encouragements to sordid vice and 
discouragements to lil^eral virtue does our commercial 
cities exhibit to popular view ! Thus, in all civilized 
and christianized countries, vice is eulogized and reward- 
ed, while virtue is traduced and punished ; and the pre- 
sent order, or rather the disorder, of society renders this 
outrage on common justice and common sense unavoida- 
ble, and till the cause is removed the etfects v.ill be always 
the same. And, for my part, I cannot see how this dread- 
ful corruption, the source of all this moral mischief, can 
be remedied or extirminated ; for it is absurd to suppose, 
that a vitiated body will purify itself. If the corrupt sup- 
porters of the obvious disorders in civil society had the 
will, as they have the power, to remove the cause, the ef- 
fects would, of course, cease ; but visionary are all such 
hopes, without the interposition of Divine providence. 
The victims of these disorders are beheld dangling under 
the gallows, not only without pity, but with contempt, 
while the authors and supporters of them are beheld in 
their splendid mansions with veneration, and almost ado- 
ration. 

Our cities are literally crowded with courtizans, though 
many of them are naturally intelligent, generous, and 
most beautiful of their sex, yet they are all despised ; 
while the abominable batchelors and unprincipled liber- 
tines, who are the primary cause of their degredation are 
highly respected. I never heard of, or saw a courtizan in 
the savage nations I visited ; because there they all mate 
like pidgeons, for love, and not for money, as we do. I 
recollect one time, in a country scarce ever visited by ci- 
vilized man, the savage prince used us with uncommon 
hospitality, gave us, without solicitation, the very best ac- 
commodation, made a savage entertainment and a w^ar 
dance for our amusement, and provided the best beds, and 
offered me a female, which I thought proper to reject. This 
is the only instance of want of delicacy, and never did I 



80 

witness a want of hospitality in these children of nature. I 
never heard of cruel husbands or scolding wives, because 
as they mate for love, when that love ceases they mate no 
longer ; but this very seldom happens. They sometimes 
have five wives, but generally no more than two. The 
above generous prince had three wives. There is one 
custom I greatly admire among some savage nations, and 
that is, the tenderness and modesty with which they treat 
their wives while pregnant, during which time they ne- 
ver know them. What an amiable pattern for the male 
and female saints of Christendom to imitate. 

The contrast I have attempted to make between civil 
and savage society, or I should rather have said, the sha- 
dow of a contrast I have made, though but a mere 
glimpse of the matter of fact. Still I hope, brief as it is, 
it will be sufficient to prove that the ills in civil society 
are imputable to man alone ; that God has provided plen- 
tifi^lly for the comfortable accommodation of all his crea- 
tures, and if they suffer it is man alone that makes them 
suffer. 

I must confess I am very desultory and unmethodical 
m this composition ; but as I have not the least hopes of 
seeing the evils I point out remedied, and many others 
I cannot find language to express ; and as I am writing 
purely for the comfort of the desperate child of misfor- 
tune, and with the view of pleasing God alone, I flatter 
myself these truths, though like wild flowers and medici- 
nal herbage in the romantic forests of South America, 
though promiscuous, may be at least profitable to some 
child of misfortune. I intend, in a separate chapter, to 
give him a hint of my own misfortunes, that he may 
thereby see the infinite utility of calamity. When young 
we are in the hands of our preceptors, as clay in the hands 
of the potter ,* when once the prejudice of education has 
taken deep root, we must be pounded in the mortar of 
calamity before even God himself can form us anew 
in Christ Jesus — the same as the earthen vessel must be 
pounded to fine dust before it can be formed again. This 
should encourage the child of misfortune to bear his ca- 
lamity with thankful patience, the same as a patient bears 
the amputation of a mortified limb v/ith patience, as no- 
thing else can save his life. 1 would wish him to view 



81 

things in their true colours. Prejudice and false educa- 
tion exhibits truth for error and error for truth ; and it 
is necessary for us to have the mists of ignorance and 
error eradicated from our minds, and have our intellec- 
tual eyes opened by the finger of heaven, before we can 
see and contemplate the sovereign beauty, which is su- 
preme delight! the harmonies and benefits of his works of 
nature ! which produces in the human mind a compound 
of pleasure, wonder, and admiration, and above all the 
knowledge of ourselves, which is the quintessence of wis- 
dom, and produces the deepest humiliation and self-abase- 
ment. 

Before I conclude this chapter, I would beg the child 
of misfortune, in order to enjoy the refined pleasure of 
true contemplation, which none of the sons of error can 
enjoy, though they read Hervey's Meditations fifty times 
over, and had all the books in the world at their com- 
mand ! to listen attentively and humbly to the intellec- 
tual voice of that infallible teacher, which Socrates used 
to calls his good genii. Mortals may pervert their rea- 
son and common sense, and every sect and party, political 
and religious, may have a reason and sense of their own, 
and each one accuse the other of being unreasonable and 
senseless ; but this celestial teacher cannot be perverted : 
his nature, his name, and his peculiar characteristic is 
love ; he waits at the door of every human heart to incul- 
cate his lessons of love, but few, alas, will hear, and 
fewer still will understand ; yet his laws are immutable, 
viz. No man shall find his happiness in hating man and 
acting accordingly ; and no man shall miss finding his 
happiness in loving man and acting with kindness towards 
him, if he does it with a single eye, or purely to please 
God alone. He who sincerely and disinterestedly obeys 
this excellent law will see beauties in nature which no 
pen can paint or tongue express. He will then turn his 
back upon Dublin, London, and even Paris, the largest 
city in Christendom, with all its royal and sacerdotal 
grandeur in one part, and its super inhuman misery and 
wretchedness in other parts, with its thousands of superb 
palaces, its dozen of splendid theatres, its eleven dozen 
steepled convents, with one hundred and sixty other 
churches, and eleven wealthv abbevs, with fiftv-seven col- 



82 

leges, sixteen courts of justice, fourteen barracks, thirty 
guard houses, twenty-six hospitals, twelve prisons and 
houses of correction, and street beggars in such abun- 
dance that, were they enumerated herein, no one would 
believe the number correct. Was I to contrast these ha- 
bitations of extravagant sensuality, royal villainy, unre- 
lenting tyranny, and ecclesiastical imposition, with the 
thousands of the abodes of sickness, sorrow, misery, and 
misfortune, desperation, and starvation, and the guilt and 
infamy produced thereby, as also the many ten thousands, 
even in this single Christian city, who live in elegant and 
extravagant indolence on the misery, crime, ahd ruin of 
their fellow mortals, and all on a spot of land not half so 
large as the smallest island of the amiable and industrious^ 
Abba ThuUa, the readers heart, though made of ada- 
mant, would almost weep tears of blood. Turn then, oh ! 
turn, ye children of misfortune, from these splendid 
abodes of golden guilt, of pampered pride, of religious 
fraud and fanaticism, and the mountains of human mise- 
ry they naturally produce, and behold, oh ! do behold, the 
land that never was polluted by the innocent blood shed 
by civilized man ; see the majestic scenery of the nod- 
ding forest, the safe retreat of millions of birds and beasts; 
view the towering mountains, the flowery vallies, the bri- 
ny ocean, and the murmuring rivers, where billions of 
fish, quadrupeds, and reptiles, participate the paternal 
care and exhaustlcss bounty of their Almighty makt^r ; 
and rest assured, that he who provides so plentifully for 
them, will not forget you nor leave you without a recom- 
pense, if you bear with patience your portion of calamity, 
indispensably necessary to prepare you for the eternal en- 
joyment of his approving smiles. Let the sons of pride, 
in fortunes arms caressed, and nursed in the lap of venal- 
ity, et them seek happiness and virtue in civilized cities, 
though, no doubt, there are even there more than seven » 
thousand who never bowed the knee to Baal, nor kissed 
his lips ; yet, for my part, when I recollect the spontane- 
ous and disinterested virtue I have seen manifested by 
savages, who could have no hope of remuneration, such 
as that of prince Louverture, the good Samaritan, and 
Abba Thulla. I certainly cannot admire any virtue I 
have ever seen practised by my christian cotemporaries, 



83 

I 

equal to theirs ; and I have travelled upwards of five 
hundred thousand miles in different nations, kingdoms, 
cities, towns, and states in Europe, Africa, and Ame- 
rica. In my intercourse with savages, I found disin- 
terested virtue! delicacy forbids me to say what kind of 
virtue, I have experienced among those who pity 
and despise these simple children of nature. I have 
visited the abodes of suvages who, while uncontaminated 
by the vices of those who called themselves Christians, 
were patriarchial in their manners, and were so patriotic 
in their dispositions that I have seen them, at a sudden 
alarm, leave an entertainment, and, in one minute, grasp 
their lances and rush like deer to meet the alarm. 

We win give a brief account of the inhabitants of the Pa- 
le w Islands at the conclusion of this chapter, as their native 
virtues were never contaminated by civilized man, there 
is more to admire and less to censure in them, than any I 
ever saw or read of. Let our sanctimonious saints, es- 
pecially those who assert that all the heathens will be 
damned, including children of a span long, who die un- 
baptised, let them read an account of these innocent chil- 
dren of nature and continue so to believe, if they can. 
Though I feel greatly grieved at the horrid prospect civil 
society presents to my view, what I express of which in 
these lines is but a glimpse ; yet do I pity those who are 
the supporters, as well as the victims, of the disorders of 
which I complain. They were corrupted by their fathers, 
and they by their grandfathers, and so on through many 
generations. They are, therefore, to be pitied, and not 
despised. However, when they see the cogent necessity 
of a reformation in the present destructive mode of edu- 
cation, and that it is their indispensible duty to avoid inspir- 
ing their children, under the name of emluation, with the 
poison of ambition, they should forthwith contribute their 
quota in producing this important reformation, as an ob- 
ject of primary importance to the oppresser and the op- 
pressed : the one is unhappy through satiety, the other 
through starvation : the first produces langour, debility, 
discontent for the present, and dread for the future, with 
pride and its thousand auxiliary vices in its train, while 
the f-econd produc<^s depredation and desperation, thefts, 
robberies, murders, and a train of crimes too horrid t© 



84 

mention, and a false education is the foundation of all 
these crimes and criminals. Yet where is there even one 
of our men of genius who will lift his little finger to at- 
tempt to remove, at least one of these mighty evils, or ra- 
ther, where is the literary man who will nOt despise these 
spontaneous remarks of a simple child of nature ? How- 
ever they may despise me, I will pity them. Indeed I study 
to forego the flowers of fancy, in these truths, the same as 
a judicious painter would avoid painting a polished dia- 
mond in order to enhance its beauty. Yet this book, 
with the important truths it contains, on which the hap- 
piness of civil society ultimately depend, perhaps will 
be consigned to oblivion with jut even a superficial inves- 
tigation ; while millions of futile and frivolous publica- 
tions in support of error, folly, and vulgar sensuality, or 
to enrich sinister authors and selfish booksellers, will be 
the order of the day amongst all classes of people. 

I must now in haste close this long chapter with a brief 
account of the admirable Abba Thulle and his people, 
that the reader, who is not totally contaminated by pre- 
judice and long standing prepossessions, may be enabled 
to judge between the population of Europe, in general, and 
Paris in particular, and the unlettered population of the 
Pelew Islands. The reader may rest assured of the au- 
thenticity of the account, which begins with the important 
crisis when the English were preparing to depart Abba 
Thulle's territory, after having received a thousand fa- 
vours, conferred on them without ostentation or the hope 
of remuneration by him and his people. 

Who can read the delineation of the ungenerous suspi- 
cion of the Antelope's crew, and the open candour, native 
sensibility, and uncommon generosity of Abba Thulle, 
without the most lively interest, veneration, and respect 
for this amiable child of nature. Or who, that has g;ot 
one drop of generous blood in his veins, can read without 
admiration the disinterested generosity of the natives in 
general who brought their little tributes of affection, 
which they could ill afford themselves, to present to those 
they would never see again. Where, in civil seciety, 
do we find such virtue, or where, rather, is it we do not 
find the opposite vice. 



85 

** Before our people quitted the Cove, (says the inge- 
nious compiler of this most interesting journal) they left 
an £fi^'Iis/i pendant hoisted on a large tree, which grew 
close to where their tents had stood ; and cut upon a plate 
of copper, the following inscription, which, after being 
nailed to a thick boaVd, was fixed to a tree near the spot 
where they had built their little vessel ; 

The Honorable 
English East India Company's Ship 

The ANTELOPE, 

HENRY WILSON, Commander, 

Was lost upon the reef north of this island 

In the night betw^een the 9th and 10th of 

August ; 

W^ho here built a vessel, 

And sailed from hence 

The 12th day of November, 1783. 

The meaning of this inscription was explained to the 
King, and that it was put up^s a memorial of the Ejiglish 
having been there. — He was pleased with the idea, and 
explained it himself to his own people, promising that it 
should never be taken down, and if by any accident it 
should happen to fall, he would take care of it, and have 
it preserved at Pelexv. 

The discourse of the day turned much on the subject 
of their departure; whilst they sat together, Abba Thulle 
addressing Captain Wilson^ said, " Tou are going" ; and 
'* xvlien go7ie^ I fear the inhabitants o/' Artingall will come 
" down in great numbers and molest me^ as they have done 
^*' frequently before ; and having lost the aid of the English, 
*' I shall be unable to resist them^ unless you will leave me 
*' a few of your muskets^ which you have already taught 
^ me to believe you wouldJ*^ Captain Wilson spoke to his 



86 

fifficers on the propriety of doing this instantly ; they 
seemed somewhat unwilling to put the arms they actual- 
ly meant to give them, into their hands till the last mo- 
ment ; that mistrust which had possessed their minds, 
still kept its hold, and appeared too strongly impressed on 
their countenances to escape the quick discernment of 
the King ; who, willing perhaps that they should know 
he had noticed their apprehensions, with that calm reflect- 
ing temper which marked his character, asked if they 
were afraid to trust him with a few arms ? " What is 
** there (said he) can make you harbour doubts of me ? I 
** never testified any fear of you, but endeavoured to con- 
" vince you that 1 wished your friendship. Had I been 
" disposed to have harmed you, I might have done it long 
" ago ; I have at all times had you in my power — but 
*^ have only exercised that power in making it useful to 
*' you — and can you not confide in me at the last?" 

" When the foregoing pages are attentively considered, 
the hospitality with which our people had been treated, 
both by Abba Thulle and the natives, from the first 
friendly interview to the present moment — who had 
spread before them whatever they had to give, or their 
countr}^ produced, and who, added to all this, as an un- 
equivocal proof of the high opinion he entertained of the 
English, was going to consign his own son to their care 
— is there a reader who, recalling all these circumstances, 
can wonder they aftected the sensibility of Abba Thulle f 
Or rather, will there be a found a reader who will not be 
ready with myself to ask, under what sun was ever tem- 
pered the steel that could cut such a passage to the heart 
as this just reproach of the King's ? Every individual 
felt its force, and its truth ; every individual also felt how 
much his mind had injured the virtues of this excellent 
man. Nor was the v/ound of this reproach rendered less 
acute by the consciousness each man had, of having been 
so lately induced, by his unjust fears, to join in such des- 
tructive counsel against him and his family. 

" But the eye of philosophy will candidlyView and dis- 
criminate between the two parties ; the people of Pelew 
tutored in the school of Nature, acted from her impulse 
alone, they v/ere open and undisguised ,* unconscious of 
deceit themselvesj they neither feared nor looked for it 



87 

IB Others. Our countrymen born and brought up in ;t 
civilized nation, where art assumes every form and co- 
loring of life, and is even perfectioned into a science, 
were fashioned by education to suspicion and distrust, 
and awake to all their busy suggestions. Such is the fa- 
tal knowledge the world teaches mankind, fencing too 
often the human heart against the inlets of its own hap- 
piness, by weakening confidence, the most valuable bond 
of society ! 

" 'I'he King's rebuke was too powerful for our people to 
resist; they instantly desired the captain to assure him, 
that whatever had been promised should be faithfully ful- 
filled, and, to convince him they could have no suspici- 
ons, the arms should be immediately given to him ; they 
accordingly sent on board for the quantity of arms they 
could with conveniency spare, and on the boat's return 
presented him with five muskets, five cutlasses, near a 
barrel of gunpowder, with gun-flints, and ball in propor- 
tion. Captain Wilson also made him a present of his 
own fowling-piece, with which he seemed to be particu- 
larly pleased, having often seen its effect on the fowls and 
other birds at Pelew. 

" And now the gentle spirit of the king appeared to 
forget the trace of all that had happened ; but the scene 
enabled every one present to transmit to posterity a most 
captivating picture of the forcible, yet mild triumph of 
virtue !" 

General idea of the Islands, — Of the King* — Of the Gene- 
ral. — Of the Chief Minister, — Of the Rupacks. — Of the 
Nature of property at Pelew, 

" The Pahs or Pelew islands are a chain of small islands, 
situated between the 5th and 9th degree of north lati- 
tude, and between 130 and 136 degrees of east longitude 
from Greenwich^ and lie in a N. E. and S. W. direction : 
they are long but narrow, of a moderate height, well co- 
vered with wood, at least such of the islands as our peo- 
ple had an opportunity of seeing. They are circled on 
the west-side by a reef of coral, of which no end could 
be seen from any eminences they were on ; this reef in 



88 

some places extends five or six leagues from the shore^ 
and in no parts that were visited, less than two or three. 

*' The reader will bear in naind that the Antelope was 
not a ship particularly sent out to explore undiscovered 
regions, or prepared to investigate the manners of man- 
kind ; it had not on board philosophers, botanists, 
draughtsmen, or gentlemen experienced in such scientifi.c 
pursuits as might enable them to examine with judgment 
objects which presented themselves, or trace nature 
through all her labyrinths. Distress threw them on these 
islands, and when there, every thought was solely occu- 
pied on the means of getting away, and liberating them- 
selves from a situation of all others the most horrible to 
the imagination^ that of being cut off for ever from the 
society of the rest of the world. 

" Forlorn and melancholy as their lot at first appeared,^ 
the gloom it cast over them was soon dispelled, by find- 
ing themselves amongst a humane race of men, who 
were superior to the wish of taking any advantage of 
their distress ; who had hearts to feel for what our peo- 
ple suifered ; benevolence to relieve their immediate 
wants ; and generosity to co-operate with them in every 
effort to work out their deliverance. The English pos- 
sessed what was in their estimation of the highest value — > 
iron and arms. The Malay wreck had, for the first time, 
thrown in their way a few pieces of the former ; the use 
and power of the latter had only been discovered to them 
by the ill fortune of our countrymen. These objects so 
desirable to them, they might unquestionably have pos- 
sessed themselves of, the number of our people capable 
of bearing arms, being only twenty-seven, the Captain 
and Surgeon included ; but their notions of moral recti- 
tude lay as a barrier against the intrusion of such a 
thought ;— renouncing every advantage of power, they 
approached them only with the smiles of benevolence. 

" All the varied courtesies offered to the English by 
the natives from whom a very different line of conduct 
had been apprehended, operated forcibly on their minds; 
and their misfortune happening at a moment when their 
assistance was very material for Abba Thulle^s service 
against his enemies ; this circumstance soon formed a 
Connection, and produced an unreserved intercourse and 



89 

steady friendship between the natives and our countrymcKa 
which, during the thirteen weeks they remained there, 
afforded them opportunity of observing the manners and 
dispositions of the inhabitants, and thereby to form some 
notion of their government and customs. If they were 
not enabled to trace the current of power through all its 
various channels, their observations could pursue it to the 
fountain-head from whence the whole seemed to take its 
rise ; and it appeared beyond a doubt that the chief autho- 
rity was lodged in the person of 

ABBA THULLE, THE KING. 

" At Velew the King was the first person in the go- 
vernment. He appeared to be considered as the father 
of his people ; and, though divested of all external de- 
corations of royalty, he had every mark of distinction paid 
to his person. His Rupacks or Chiefs approached him 
with the greatest respect ; and his common subjects, 
whenever they passed near him, or had occasion to 
address him, put their hands behind them, and crouched 
towards the ground ; even if they were passing any house 
or place where the king was supposed to be, they humi- 
liated themselves in the same manner, till they had got 
beyond his probable presence, when they resumed their 
usual mode of walking. On all occasions the behaviour 
of Abba Thxilh appeared gentle and gracious, yet always 
full of dignity ; he heard whatever his subjects had to say 
to him, and, by his affability and condescension, never suf» 
fered them to go away dissatisfied. This personage, how- 
ever great he was held at Pelew, was not understood by 
our people to possess a sovereignty over all the islands 
which came within their knowledge. The Rupacks of 
Emxings^ Emillegue^ and Artmg-all^ and the Rupack 
Maath^ were independent in their own territories. Yet 
Abbd Thulle had several islands over which he ruled ; and 
all the observations that follow are solely confined to his 
government, though it is not improbable that the other 
islands might have much similitude in their system. 

" Upon all occurences of moment, he convened the Ri:- 
packs and officers of state ; their councils were always 
held in the open air, upon the square pavements whicli 
have so frequently been mentioned in the forgoing nar 



90 

rative, where the King first stated the business upoa- 
which he had assembled them,, and submitted it to their 
consideration ; each i?w/?ac/^. present delivered his opinion,, 
but without rising from his seat :. whea the matter before 
them was settled, the King, standing up, put an end ta 
the council* After which they often entered into fami- 
liar conversation, and sometimes chatted together for an 
hour after their business was dispatched. 

"When any message was brought to the King, whether 
in council or elsewhere, if it came by one of the common 
people, it was delivered at some distance, in a low voice, 
to one of the inferior Rupackf> ; who, bending in aa hum- 
ble manner,, at the King's side, delivered the message in 
a low tone of voice with his face turned aside. — His com- 
mands appeared to be absolute ; though he acted in no 
important business without the advice of his Chiefs. In 
council there was a particular stone on which the King 
sat ; the other Rnpacks did not always take the same 
place, seating themselves sometimes on his right hand 
and sometimes on his left. 

" Every day in the afternoon- the King, whether he 
was at Pelew, or with the English at Oroolorg, went to 
sit in public, for the purpose of hearing any requests, on 
of adjusting any difference or dispute which might have 
arisen among his subjects. 

" As these people had but little property to create dissen- 
sion,.and nolawyers to foement animosity,it is probable that 
the immutable boundaries of right and wrong were per- 
fectly understood, and not often violated ; whenever they 
were, the offending party received the King's censure, 
which exposed them to general shame ;. a sentence to un- 
corrupted minds, far more severe than any penal institu- 
tion.. They could not recur to the dubious construction 
of five hundred laws, vaguely conceived, and worse un- 
derstood; under the obscurity of which, in civilized couuf 
tries, the artful villian too often takes shelter, and the in- 
jured sit down more oppressed. Happy for them, they 
were ignorant of the casuisty and refinement which can 
argue vice into virtue ! nor were acquainted with the lau- 
danum of rhetoric, whose property will occasionally benum 
and lay dormant the power of common understanding t 
Th«y had no conception that there existed polished n^-^ 



91 

iions, where it was mfinitely more expensive to sue liar 
justice than to submit to fraud and oppression ! — nations 
where men's oath^ only, not men's words^ were credited ! 
and where there were found wretches who dared attack 
the property and lives of their fellow-citizens, by asser- 
tions oi falsehood^ whilst they solemnly and impiously in- 
voked the God of Heaven to attest their truth I — Born 
the children of Nature, and secluded from the corrup- 
tion of the world, her laws were their general guide. 
Their r^o/ wants were few, and they saw nothing to excite 
artificial ones. Every one seemed to be occupied with 
their own humble pursuits ; and as far as our people, in 
a stay of three months with the natives, could decide, 
appeared to conduct themselves towards each other with 
great civility and benevolence ; for they never observed 
any wrangling or open passion. Even when children 
were disputing or fighting, they strongly marked their 
displeasure, by stifling with rebuke their little impetu- 
ositieSa 

THE GENERAL. 

" The next in power was the King's brother, Raa Kooky. 
officially General of all his forces. It was tns duty ta 
summon the Rupacks to attend the King, on whatever 
expedition or purpose they were called ; but though Raa 
Kook acted as Commander in Chief, yet all the executive 
orders came from the King, whenever he attended in per- 
son, as fully appeared when they went on the second ex- 
pedition to Artvjg'all^ where the canoes attendant on the 
King conveyed to the General all the resolutions which 
he thought advisable to adopt. The General, as the 
King's next brother, was his presumptive heir ; the suc- 
cession of Pclew not going to the King's children, till it 
had passed through the King's brothers ; so that after the 
demise of Abba Thidle^ the sovereignty would have de- 
scended to Raa Kook^ on his demise to Arra Kooker^ and 
en the death of this last brother, it would have reverted 
to the eldest son oi Abba Thidle ; on which contingency,, 
^ui Bill being the presumptive heir, would, during thfr 
reign of his last surviving uncle, have become of course: 
the hereditary General; as Lee Boo would when the sO'- 
T^ereierntv had fallen to his elder brother*. 



92 



THE MINISTER. 

'* The King was always attended by a particular Chief,. 
€>r Rapack, who did not appear to possess any heredita- 
ry office, but only a delegated authority. He was always 
near the King's person, and the Chief who was first con- 
sulted : but whether his office was religious or civil, or 
both, our people never could learn with any certainty* 
He was not considered as a warrior, nor ever bore arms f 
and had only one wife, whereas the other Rupacks had 
two. The English were never invited to his house, or 
introduced into it, although they were conducted to al- 
most all those of the other Chiefs. 

THE RUPACKS. 

" This class, though considerable in number, could 
only be regarded as Chiefs, or, to describe them by Eu- 
ropean notions, might be denominated the nobles ; they 
were not all of the same degree, as was distinguishable by a 
difference in the Bone they wore; some were created while 
our people were there, after the second engagement at Ar- 
tingall. These marks of honour were conferred solely by 
the King, in the manner already described, when Captain 
Wilson was invested with the highest Order of the Bone.^ 
The principal Rupacks generally attend the King, and 
were always ready at his command, to accompany him 
on any expedition,, with a number of canoes, properly 
manned, and armed with darts and spears, who were to 
remain with him till they had his permission to return 
home with their dependants. Though in this part of 
their government we trace an outline of the feudal sys- 
tem, yet, from the very few opportunities our people 
could have of investigating f>oints of internal government^ 
it appeared to them that the titles of Rupacks were per- 
sonal badges of rank and distinction, nor did they appre- 
hend they were hereditary honors, unless in the reigning 
family, who must of necessity be of this class ; therefore. 



* Our people never knew what animal this was a bone of; but 
by subnnitting the inspection of it to the best authority in thi» 
country, it is supposed to be part of the bone of a whale, or some 
animal of that species. 



93 

as to the extent of the power or privileges of the Rupacks^ 
I conceive it far better to leave these matters to future dis- 
coveries, (should any hereafter be made) than to obtrude 
opinions on a subject that might turn out to be fallacious. 
Thus much seemed certain, that all those of the first or- 
der were summoned to Abba ThuUe^s councils, paid hin» 
on every occasion a visible obedience, and were them- 
selves much respected by the rest of the people. 

PROPERTY. 

" Considering that during the time our people remain- 
ed on these islands, their minds were principally engag- 
ed by their own concerns, it will hardly be supposed they 
had much leisure to investigate a subject of this nature. 
As far as they could obtain intelligence on this point, 
they understood that the natives only possessed a pro- 
perty in their work and labour, but no absolute one in 
the soil, of which the king appeared to be general pro- 
prietor. — A man's house, furniture, or canoe, was consi- 
dered as his private property ; as was also the land al- 
lotted him, as long as he occupied and cultivated it j 
but whenever he removed with his family to another 
place, the ground he held reverted to the king, who gave 
it to whom he pleased, or to those who solicited to cul- 
tivate it. Every family occupied some land for their 
maintenance, necessity imposed this labour on them ; and 
the portion of time which they could spare from provid- 
ing for their natural wants, passed in the exercise of 
such little arts, as, while they kept them industrious and 
active, administered to their convenience and comfort. 

Of the Produce of Pelew^ and of the Woy of Life of the 
Natives, 

PRODUCE. 

" Every part of the island called Coorooraa, of which 
Pelew was the Capital (as far as our people had opportu-' 
nities of making observations) seemed to bear the marks 
of industry and good cultivation. All the islands which 
our people saw were well covered with trees of various 
kinds and sizes, some of them being very large, as may 



94 

which, when of the largest dimensions, were capable of 
carrying twenty-eight or thirty men. — They had a great 
variety of timber-trees, among which was noticed the 
Ebony, and a tree, that, being pierced or wounded by a 
gimblet, there ran from it a thick white liquid, of the 
consistence of cream. The had also a species of the 
Manchineel tree, in cutting down of which our people 
used to get blistered and swelled ; the inhabitants point- 
ed out the cause, saying, that it was owing to their being 
sprinkled by the sap of this tree. This they reckoned 
among the unlucky trees, and advised our people against 
the use of it. But the most singular tree noticed at Pe- 
lew, was one, in size and in its manner of branching, not 
unlike our Cherry-tree, but in its leaves resembling the 
Myrtle. Its peculiarity w^as, that it had no bark, having 
only an outward coat of about the thickness of a card, 
darker than the inside, though equally close in texture ; 
the colour of the interior part being nearly that of ma- 
hogany, and so extremely hard, that few of the tools 
which the English had, could work it, the wood breaking 
their edges almost every moment ; a circumstance which, 
very early in the construction of their vessel, determined 
our people against the use of it. They had also the 
Cabbage-tree ; and a tree whose fruit nearly resembled 
an almond ;^ the Carambola ; and the wild Bread-fruit, 
called by the natives RiVmall. Yams f and cocoa nuts 
being the chief article of sustenance, were attended to 
with the utmost care ; the former were of the grey mot- 
tled kind ; the latter were in large plantations, affording^ 
both food and shade. The beetle-nut they had in abun- 
dance, and made great use of it, though only when green r 
contrary to the practice of the people of India, who ne- 
ver use it but when dry. They possessed Plantains and 
Bananas, Seville oranges and lemons ; neither of these 
were in any considerable quantity ; therefore only pro* 
duced on visits, or occasions of more than common cere- 
mony. To these may be added, the jamboo-apple, men* 
tionedin page 173, as brought when Ze?^ Boo first ap- 



* Terminalia catappa of Linnaeus. 
t Arum escuIeniUQi of Lin x^us. 



jl££Qjl^^ 



95 



peared. This country produced some sugar 
great abundance of the bamboo; likewise the 
which the natives used as a die, and with whi( 
men stained their skins. They have ochre, 
and yellow, with which they paint their hous< 
noes. 

"-None of the islands the English visited ha( 
of grain ; nor anv quadruped whatever, ex 
brownish grey rats, which ran wild in the w 
three or four meagre cats, which were seer 
houses at Pelevv, probably brought on some dr 
of a canoe of other islands, wrecked on the r 
might excite them to admire so much the twc 
pex)ple left with them, which unluckily were b 

" As to birds, they had plenty of common 
hens, which, though they were not domesti 
ran about the woods, yet loved to get near th( 
and plantations ; and, what will appear sinj 
sidering their little variety of food) they had n 
any use of them, till our people saw them, ai 
natives they were exctrllc nt to eat. The Eng 
desire of Abba Thulle killed some, and boiled 
king was the first who tasted them ; he tho 
good, and frequently partook of them afterwai 
our people put them in possession of a new 
men appeared pleased at seeing them killed, 
go out on purpose to drive them in their way« 
the natives had not till now made these birds 
of food, yet, when they went into the woods 
quently eat their eggs ; but they did not admii 
being newly laid ^ the luxury to them was, 
could swallow an imperfect chicken in the 
Pidgeons they had also in the woods. At tl 



mentioned, were the only birds they used to eat. Our 
people left them two geese, the only remains of their live 
stock. 

" Several birds were seen flying about, whose plumage 
appeared to be extremely beautiful, but they probably 
might be of the same kinds as are found in different 
countries between the tropics. The islands had also se- 
veral small birds, whose notes were very melodious, par- 
ticularly one which used to sing every morning and eve- 
ning, and had a pipe sweet as aflagelet ; our people often 
thought they were under tl>e very tree whence the notes 
©f this little bird came, yet none of them were ever cer- 
tain they had seen it. 

" They had a variety offish, beside the sort I have al- 
ready described (page 83) and several smaller kinks, of 
very beautiful colours and a variety of shapes, particu- 
larly one to which the English gave the name of the Uni- 
corn, from a horn growing out of its forehead; its skin 
was rough, like a small shark or dog-fish, which it also 
resembled in shape and color. They had the grey mul- 
let, which they crimped, and frequently eat raw. They 
kill the shark, when they chance to come within the coral 
reef; this they do by spearing them, and afterwards get- 
ting ropes round them, then dragging them on shore ; the 
flesh of , the shark was esteemed by them as very deli- 
cate. They had also several kinds of shell-fish ; such as 
the sea cray-fish, of the same sort as in the Mediterra- 
nean and other European coasts : and turtle, which the 
natives boiled, and seemed to admire- They had beside 
oysters, muscles, and a variety of cockles, particularly 
the Kima cockle ;* this they frequently got by diving, at 
which the natives were amazingly expert ; they would 
sometimes dive down in six or seven fathom water, and 
if the shell was very large, two of them would contrive 
to bring it up between them. This fish they commonly 
cat raw. 

** The islands of Pelew, when viewed from the sea, ex- 
hibited high, rugged land, well covered with wood. The 
interior part was in many places mountainous, but the 






* Chama Gigas of Linnaus. 



vallics were extensive and beautiful, spreading before the 
eye many delicious prospects. The soil was in general 
rich ; they had a great deal of grass, which, having no 
cattle whatever to eat down, grew high, and was scorch- 
ed and birrnt up by the heat of the sun. Our people 
saw no river at Pelew ; their supplies of fresh water be- 
ing from small streams and ponds, of which there were 
many. The chief source at Oroolong, was the well at 
the back of the island, which afforded the English suffi- 
cient for their use whilst they remained tnere, and 
enough to water their vessel for their voyage, by collect- 
ing it daily in casks till they had obtained as much as 
they stood in need of. 



OF TUEIR WAY OF LIVING. 

'^Frorn the above account of the scanty produce of 
these islands, it must be evident that no luxury reigned 
in them. To their usual mode of living, on particular 
occasions they added some sweetmeats, which they ob- 
tained by the aid of a syrup extracted either from the 
palm-tree, or the sugar-cane (which grows spontaneous) 
and with which also they made their sweet drink. Their 
sweetmeats were of three sorts ; — the first, and the one 
that was most plentiful, was made of the kernels of old 
cocoa-nuts, scraped into a coarse kind of flour, then mix- 
ed with the syrup, and simmered over a slow fire till it 
became of a proper consistence, and whilst warm was 
put up in leaves ; it acquired such hardness by keeping, 
that a knife would hardly cut it ; the natives called it 
AVoolell, and was the same our sailors denominated 
Choke-Dog. — The second sort was made of the fruit al- 
ready mei'.tioned as resembling the almond, not bruised, 
but whole, boiled in the same manner, and put in leaves. 
The third was a wet sweetmeat, clear and transparent ; this 
was uncommon, but was made at Captain Wilson's com- 
ing away, and presented to him in the same large tureen 
of wood which was brought out on his first visit to the 
king. Abba Thullc^ when he presented it, said, that he 



98 

gave him th6 tureen,^ but that his wi\ es had prepared 
the sweetmeat on purpose for him. On the Captain's 
noticing that it appeared different from any of the sorts 
he had seen before, and wishing to know of what it was 
made, Eaa Kook despatched a man, who in an hour re- 
turned with two fresh- gathered plants ; from the root of 
them this sweetmeat was made, which in shape, size, 
and colour, resembled a common turnip ;f its leaves were 
three feet and upwards in length, but narrow and green ; 
Captain Wilson was going to taste a bit of the root raw, 
but they would not suffer him, signifying that it was not 
good, by spitting, as if they had something unpleasant in 
their mouth. This sweetmeat did not keep so well as 
the other two sorts, growing soon sour. They had also 
a method of scraping the kernel of the cocoa-nut into a 
pulp, which when mixed with some of their sweet drink, 
and the juice of the sour orange, had the appearance of 
curds and whey. 

*' Their mode of preserving fish, when there was plen- 
ty, so that it would keep a day or two, has been fully ex- 
plained in page 128. Some of the other sorts of 
fish they boiled in salt water, and eat without any kind 
of sauce ; they also boiled the sea cray-fish ; but the smal- 
ler sort of shell-fish, and the Kima Cockle, they usually 
eat raw, squeeziing only a little orange or lemon- juice 
over it ; and the grey mullet (though they sometimes 
boiled it) yet was more commonly eaten raw : as soon as 
caught they cleaned and crimped it, then laid it about an 
hour in the sun to harden, by which time it was fully 
drest to their taste. 

" They had no salt, nor did they make use of sauce or 
seasoning in any thing they eat. Their drink was as 
simple as their diet : at their meals, the milk of the cocoa- 
nut was their usual beverage ; they very seldom drank 
water, and indeed so very little of any thing, that it was 
a matter of surprise to our people, who constantly obser- 



* Oar people could never learn the name by which the iiatives 
Cfilled this vessel, of which one only was seen, and therefore have 
termed it a tureen, as resembling it in form. 

tit was probably the Tacrafiinnati/ida of Linnaeus. 



99 

ved it ; yet on visits, or occasional rejoicings they apr 
peared to relish their sweet drink, and sherbet, which 
latter had only the addition of some juice of orange. 

^* They rose in general at day- light, and as soon as 
they were up, both men and women went to bathe in 
fresh water : they had seperate bathing-places ; and every 
mim whose business led him near those appropriated to 
the women, was obliged to make some particular halloo, 
which, if answered by a female voice, he could not go 
on, but either turned another way, or waited till the wo- 
men, who were bathing, had left the water. 

" About eight o'clock was their hour of breakfasting ; 
after which^ if there was any council to be held, the king 
met his chiefs, and the common people went to their dif- 
ferent occupations ; at noon they dined ; and supped soon 
after sunset, usually retiring to rest two hours after.— 
Though this was their common way of living, yet on 
occasions of public rejoicing or festivity, they would 
dance the greatest part of the right. 

" They had no method, that was observed of measur- 
ing time but by the height of the sun. Their seasons 
were divided into the wet and dry, as in other tropical 
countries. They had some knowledge of the stars, hav- 
ing names for several of them, which they pointed out to 
our people. 

" Every part of the Pelew islands, that the English vi- 
sited, appeared populous, thotigh to what extent of po- 
pulation they could never ascertain ; but probable con- 
jecture might be formed, from Abba Thulle and his al- 
lies having sent out, in the last expedition against Pelew, 
near four thousand men; nor had our people reason 
to suppose but that there were many more left behind 
equally fit for service : even had the occasion required 
it, perhaps their number of canoes might not have been 
adequate to carry to battle near their full strength. 

Of their houses. — Their domestic impleme7}ts. — Their 
weapons of war. — Their canoes, 

THEIR HOUSES. 

" Their houses were raised about three feet from the 
ground, placed on larjre stones, which aoDeared as if cut 



100 

from the quarry, being thick and oblong, on these pedes- 
tals the foundation beams were laid, from whence sprang 
the upright supports of their sides, which were crossed 
by other timbers grooved together, and fastened by wood- 
en pins ; the intermediate spaces closely filled up with 
bamboos and palm-leaves, which they platted so closely 
and artifically as to keep their habitations warm, and ex- 
clude all wet ; and their being raised from the ground 
preserved them from any humidity. The floors were in 
general made of very thick plank, a space of an inch or 
two being left between many of them. But in some of 
the houses they were composed of large bamboos split, 
which being perpetually trodden over, render them very 
slippery. The interior part of the house was without 
any division, the whole forming one great room. In ge- 
neral, the fireplace stood about the middle of it, sunk 
lower than the floor, with no timber below it, the whole 
space being filled' up with hard rubbish. Their fires 
were in common but small, being mostly used to boil 
their yams, and to keep up a little flames at night to clear 
away the dews, and smoke the mosquitoes. Their win- 
dows came to the level of the floor, and served both for 
doors and v/indows, having stepping-stones at all of them 
to enter by ; to prevent any inconvenience from wind or 
rain, which so many appertures might occasion, each of 
them had a bamboo frame or shutter, interwoven as the 
sides of the houses were, which, sliding on bamboo rods, 
were easily slipt on one side when any body wanted to go 
in or out. On the top of the upright sides, beams were 
laid across from whence sprang the roof, which was 
pointed like our barns, the whole inside being clear ; this 
made their houses within very lofty and airy ; the out- 
side of the roof was thatched very thick and close with 
bamboos or palm-leaves. This was the general form of 
their houses ; some of which were from sixty to eighty 
feet in length, but these were appropriated to public 
uses, such as meetings of business, or festivity ; at other 
times they served the natives ^o assemble and chat to- 
gether, when the women usually brought their work, and 
joined in the conversation. Those which were more 
properly domestic habitations, were the same both in 
shape and texture, though less in dimension. It was re- 



101 

marked, that the family kept on the one side the central 
fire-place, and the servants on the other. 

OF THEIR DOMESTIC IMPLEMENTS. 

" In a country where no aid could be obtained from 
the assistance of iron tools, and where every thing which 
was convenient and useful could only be produced by 
much time, labor, and patience, and at last fashioned by 
such poor means as necessity, stimulating invention, by 
slow degrees brought about, it will not be expected that 
their domestic implements would be numerous. 

" Among the things most essential to their idea of com- 
fort, were little baskets which they always carried about 
with them ; they had different sorts, some of them were, 
of very nice texture, woven from slips of the plantain- 
leaf. In these they usually carried their beetle-nut, 
their comb, and their knife ; nor did they omit having a 
little twine in it, to tie up any thing they might want to 
keep together. They had also wooden baskets with co- 
vers, very nicely carved, and inlaid with shells. These 
they hung up in their houses, for use and decoration. 

" Their best knives were formed of a piece of the large 
mother of pearl oyster-shell, ground narrow, and the out- 
ward side a little polished. The sort more common was 
made of a piece of some muscle-shell, or of a split bam- 
boo, which they sharpen to an edge, and render exceed- 
ingly serviceable. 

*' Their combs were formed of the orange tree ; the 
handle and teeth fashioned from the solid wood, and not 
in seperate pieces closely connected together like those 
brought from most of the late-discovered islands. 

" No man stirred abroad without his basket or beetle- 
nut. The common order of people had a short piece of 
bomboo, in which they carried the powdered chinam, 
to strew over the beetle-nut before they put it in. their 
mouths. The Rupaeks or great people had their chinam 
in a long slender * bamboo, nicely polished, and inlaid 
with pieces of shells at each end ; and these were often 
not inelegantly fancied. 

" Their fishing hooks were of tortoise-shell. Their 
twines, their cords, and all their fishinor-nets, were well 



102 

manufactured, and made from the husks of the cocoa- 
nut. The mats on which they slept, and threw over 
them when at rest, were formed of the plantain-leaf. 

" At their meals they generally used a plantain-leaf in- 
stead of a plate; the shell of the cocoa-nut serving as a 
cup to drink out of, which they sometimes polished very 
nicely. They made also vessels of a kind of earthen- 
ware, of a reddish brown color, and mostly of an oval 
shape. In these they heated their water, and boiled their 
fish, yams, &c. Our people observed the natives were 
particularly careful of this pottery, never permitting any 
of it to approach the fire unless gradually, and always 
moving it with great caution ; from which circumstances 
it is probable they have not yet been able to discover a 
method of burning it sufficiently. 

" A bundle of cocoa-nut husks, tied together, formed 
a broom, to dust or sweep their habitations. The only 
conveniency they had of keeping water in their houses; 
or bringing it from their springs, was in thick bamboos, 
that had a bore of five or six inches diameter ; these they 
placed upright, and stooped them when they wanted to 
pour any out, being at the upper end lipped so as to form 
a kind of spout. 

" Their hatchets were not unlike those of the South 
Sea islands, of which so many have been seen in Eng- 
land ; the blade part being made of the strongest part of 
the large kima cockle, ground to a sharp edge. But 
they were happy to adopt iron, when it had been givea 
to them* 

" They had also another kind of hatchet, which was 
fbrmed in a manner to move round in a groove, that the 
edge might act longitudinally or transversely, by which 
it would serve as a hatchet or an adze, as occasion re- 
quired. Uncouth as their hatchets might appear to our 
people, it was a matter of surprise, to observe in how 
little a time the natives were able to fell a tree with 
them;» though not without breaking several. 

" The things which I have above mentioned were such 
as their natural wants required ; when these had been 
provided against, ingenuity thereto superadded a few ar* 
ticTes, which might in these islands be deemed luxuries. 
The shell of the tortoise was there remarkably beautify!. 



103 

and the natives of Pclew had discovered the art of 
moulding it into little trays or dishes, and into spoonsf 
with which, on particular occasions, they eat their fish 
and yams. — Some of the great ladies had also bracelets 
of the same manufacture, and ear-rings inlaid with 
shells. 

*' How they conceived this«rt of working the tortoise- 
N^hell, or the idea of improving on a natural advantage, 
di; what process they made use of to effect it, our people 
had no opportunity of discovering, 

" On days of public festivity, there was usually brought 
out the vessel mentioned in page 68, and there described 
as representing a bird, the top of which lifted off, form- 
ing its back. It contained about thirty-six English 
quarts ; and was filled with sweet drink for the king and 
his Rupacks. This was Abba Thulle's property ; and 
when one considers it as the work of so much time and 
patience (and the more estimable, as being the only ves- 
sel of the kind in their country) the king's giving it to 
captain Wilson at his departure, as already mentioned, 
was an additional proof of the liberality of these people, 
who were ready to divest themselves even of what they 
most valued, to give to their friends. 

THEIR WEAPONS OF WAR. 

" The principal weapons used in their battles, were 
spears ; they were commonly about twelve feet long^ 
formed of the bamboo, with the pointed end made of 
some wood exceedingly hard ,* they were barbed trans- 
versely, so that, having once^ entered the body, it was 
difiiciJt to draw them out without lacerating the flesh, 
and widening to a great degree the wound. 

" Another war-weapon was the dart and sling. The 
sling was a piece of wood about two feet in length, with 
a notch made in it, wherein the head of the dart was fix- 
ed. The dart was of bamboo, pointed with an extreme 
hard and heavy kind of wood, like the spear, which they 
compressed with their hand, till they elasticity of the 
bamboo had formed such a curve as experience told 
them would reach the object aimed at ; then letting 
it slip from the notch, it flew forth, and fell by its gravi- 



tatioii with the point downwards, so as to effect the pur- 
pose of being destructive if it fell upon the enemy. — 
It is hardly to be conceived with what address they di- 
rected this weapon, or the distance at which it would 
prove mortal. Their spears were only calculated for a 
certain distance, not being in general missible beyond 
fifty or sixty feet. They had other spears about eighteen 
feet long, which were only used when they came to close 
quarters with the enemy. 

" When they went to battle, some of the Rupacks car- 
ried in their canoes a kind of sword, made of very hard 
wood, and inlaid with parts of shells ; this they only 
made use of in personal engagement ; they were of suffi- 
cient weight to cleave a man's skull. 

" Our people saw a very few daggers, made of the sting 
of the Ray fish, which is jagged all upwards from the 
point ; they sheathed them iu a bamboo, and their han- 
dles were of wood, formed into some grotesque shape ; 
the whole length of the weapon not exceeding thirteen 
inches. 

THEIR CANOES. 

*' As their battles were generally fought in canoes, 
these may with propriety follow the account of their war- 
like implements. 

" They were, like most other canoes, made from the 
trunk of a tree dubbed out ; but our people, who had 
often seen vessels of this sort in many other countries^ 
thought those of Pelew surpassed in neatness and beau- 
ty any they had ever met with elsewhere ; the tree out 
of which they were formed, grew to a very considerable 
height, and resembled much the English ash. — They 
were painted red, both within and without,* and inlaid 



* " As their mode of applying thfiir paint was uncommon, it 
may merit being particularly described : The colours are crumb- 
led with the hand into -water, whilst it is warming over a gentle 
fire in earthen pots ; they carefully skim from the surface* what- 
ever dry leaves or dirt may float on the top ; when they find it 
sufficiently thick, they apply it warm, and let it dry upon the 



105 

with shells in different forms. — When they went out in 
state, the heads and sterns were adorned with a variety 
of shells strung on a cord, and hung in festoons. — The 
smallest vessel that they built, could hold four or five 
people, the largest were able to contain from twenty- 
five to thirty. — they carried an outrigger, but only on 
one side ; and used latine sails made of matting. As 
they were not calculated to resist a very rough sea, they 
rarely went without the coral reef, and seldom within 
it, had they any violent sea to encounter ; whenever it 
blew hard the natives always kept close under shore.— 
In visits of ceremony, when the king or the great Re- 
packs approached the place where they intended to land, 
the rowers flourished their paddles with wonderful ad- 
dress, and the canoes advanced with a stately movement; 
at other times they got on with an amazing velocity. — 
When they went against Artingall, the little canoes, 
which our people termed frigates, as carrying orders 
from the king to his officers, flew about like arrows, 
and scarcely seemed to touch the water. In the grand 
expedition to Pelelew, where a fleet of upwards of three 
hundred canoes, of different sizes, were collected toge- 
ther, they formed a most beautiful and splendid appear- 
ance. 

Of th^ People and their Customs. — Of their Marriages,'-^ 
Of their Funerals — Of their ReH^ion* — General Cha- 
racter of the Natives. 

" The natives of these islands are a stout, well-made 
people, rather above the midille stature ; their com- 
plexions are of a far deeper color than what is under- 
stood by the Indian, copper, but not black. — Their 
hair is long and flowing, rather disposed to curl, which 
they mostly form into one large, loose curl round their 
heads ; some of the women, who have remarkably long 
hair, let it fall loose down their backs. It has already 



wood : the next clay they rub it well over with cccoa nut oil ; and 
with the dry husk nf the cocoa- nur, give it, by repeated rubbing, 

a nnliah anil stahilitv thar thp wavpR r.annnt wash nfF. 



106 

been observed, that the men were entirely naked ; the 
women wore only two little aprons, or rather thick 
fringes, one before and one behind, about ten inches deep 
and seven wide ; these were made of the husks of the 
eocoa-nut stripped into narrow slips, which they dyed 
with different shades of yellow : this, their only dress 
they tied round their waists, commonly with a piece of 
line, though such as were of higher rank used a string of 
some kind of beads ; one of a coarse sort of cornelian, 
worn by Erre Bess^ who understanding that Captain 
Wilson had a daughter, gave it to Mr. H. Wilson, be- 
fore his departure, as a present for his sistCr. 

** Both men and women were tatooed, or, as they call 
it, melgothcd : this operation took place as our people 
conceived, at a certain period of youth, they having 
never seen any children of either sex marked by it.— 
The men had their left ear bored, and the women both ; 
a few of the first wore beads in the perforated ear, the 
latter put either some leaf through, or an ear ring of tor- 
toise shell inlaid. The cartilage between the nostrils 
was also bored in both sexes, through which they fre- 
quently put a little sprig or blossom of some plant or 
shrub that accidentally caught their fancy.* 

" When the men and women grew up, their teeth were 
blacked : this was done by the means of some dye j our 
people, whilst they remained at Pelew, had no oppor- 
tunity of seeing how the effect was produced, under- 
standing only it was an operation that was both tedious 
and painful ,• but it was afterwards fully explained by 
Lee Boo to Captain Wilson, on his passage to England.— 
At Saint Helena, Lee Boo appeared much delighted at 
finding some groundsel, and chewing it, rubbed his teeth 
with it. Captain Wilson telling him it was not good to 
eat, he gave him to understand that they had it at Pelew, 
and used it with four other herbs, bruised together and 



* " Perhaps it is owing to the desire of having the scent of 
flowers, without inconvenience of holding them, that the Eastern 
people bore the cartilage between the nostrils. The common 
people in Italy also wear sweet-smelling flowers stuck behind 
the ear, in such a manner as fall on the face, that they may en- 
joy their fragrance when working or walking. 



107 

mixed with a little chinam into a paste, which was appli- 
ed to the teeth every morning, in order to dye them 
black ; the patients lying with their heads upon the floor, 
and letting the saliva run out of their mouth. — At 
night, he said, the paste was taken away, and they were 
permitted to eat a little. The same process was repeat- 
ed the day following, and five days were necessary to 
complete the operation. Lee Boo described it as a thing 
which gave them a great deal of trouble, and made them 
extremely sick. 

Both sexes were very expert at swimming, and ap- 
peared to be as perfectly at ease in the water as on land, 
— The men were admirable divers ; if they saw any 
thing at the bottom of the sea which attracted their no- 
tice, they would jump overboard instantly and bring it 
up. 

THEIR MARRIAGES. 

" These were probably no more than a civil contract, 
but at the same time that kind of contract which was 
regarded as inviolable. They allowed a plurality of 
wives, but in general had not more than two ; Raa Kook 
had three ; the king five, though not living together. — 
They did not appear to be in any degree jealous of them, 
permitting them to partake of all their diversions. 

" When a woman was pregnant, although she accompa- 
nied her husband, yet she never slept with him, but al- 
ways separated at night ; and this was uniformly prac- 
tised by all the sex, even among the lowest class of the 
inhabitants ; and it was remarked, that during that pe- 
riod the utmost attention was observed to women in that 
situation. When any chief appeared with his too wives, 
they usually sat on either side of the husband, and the 
people seemed to pay them no other attention, but what 
is usual in an intercourse of the sexes, where the greatest 
good manners prevail. One of our people, endeavour- 
ing to make himself agreeable to a lady belonging to one 
of the Rupacks, by what we should term a marked assi- 
duity, Arra Kooker, with the greatest civility, gave him 
to understand it was not right to do so. 



108 

" They name the children very soon after they are 
born ; this is most probably done without any ceremony. 
One of Abba Thulie's wives lay in of a son at Pelew, 
during the time our people were at Oroolong ; the king, 
out of his regard for Captain Wilson, named the little 
boy Captain, and afterwards informed Captain Wilson of 
the circumstance. 

THEIR FUNERALS. 

" In the foregoing narrative an account has been given 
of the ceremony observed by Mr. Sharp, at the interment 
of Raa Kook's son in the island of PethouU. Mr. M. 
Wilson, at that time at Pelew, was present at another 
funeral, of a young man who had died of the wounds 
he had received in the same battle in which the King's 
nephew Jiad lost his life. The account he gave me of it 
was as as follows : — That accidentally noticing a number 
of the natives going towards a small village^ about two 
miles from the capital, and hearing that the King was 
gone thither, curiosity induced him to join the throng. 
When he got to the place, he found a great crowd, sur- 
rounding a pavement on which Abba Thulle was seated. 
The dead body was brought from a house not far distant. 
The procession stopped as it passed before the king, 
who, without rising from his seat, spoke very audibly, 
for a short time, and then the procession went on. — 
Whether what he said was an eulogium on the departed 
youth, who had fallen in his country's service, neither 
of the linguists being present, could not be ascertained ; 
but from the solemn manner in which the king deliver- 
ed his speech, and the respectful silence with which the 
people listened to him, it is by no means improbable but 
that this was the purport of it. 

" Mr. M. Wilson followed the body to the place of in- 
terment; he observed an elderly woman getting out of 
the new-made grave, whom he conceived might be the 
mother, or some near relation, whom affection had 
drawn to the melancholy scene, to be satisfied that eve- 
ry thing was duly prepared. When the corpse was laid 
in the earth, the lamentation of the women attending 
was very great. — It appeared, on this occasion, as well 



10§ 

as at the funeral of Raa Kook'^s son, that no men, but 
those who conveyed the body, were present ; these last 
sad offices were left to the tenderness of the weaker sex; 
the men only assembled round the body, before it was 
carried to the grave, where they preserved a solemn si 
Icnce ; their minds, from principles of fortitude or philo- 
sophv, being armed to meet the events of mortality with 
manly submission, divested from the external testimony 
of human weakness. 

^' They had places appropriated to sepulture. Their 
graves were made as ours are in country church-yards ; 
having the mould raised up in a ridge, over where the 
body was deposited. — Some had stones raised above 
them, with a flat one laid horizontally over, and sur- 
rounded by a kind of hurdle-work, to prevent any one 
from treading over them. 

THEIR RELIGION. 

*' There arc few people, I believe, among the race of 
men, whom navigation hath brought to our knowledge, 
who have not shewn, in some instance or other, a sense 
of something like religion, however it might be mixed 
with idolatry or superstition ; and yet our people, during 
their continuance with the natives of Pelew, never saw 
any particular ceremonies, or observed any thing that had 
the appearance of public worship. — Indeed, circum- 
stanced as the English were, they had not enough of the 
language to enter on topics of this nature ; and it might 
also hiive been indiscreet to have done it, as such inqui- 
ries might have been misconceived or misconstrued by 
the natives. Added to this, their thoughts were natu- 
rally all bent on getting away, and preserving, whilst 
they remained there, the happy intercourse that subsist- 
ed between them. 

Though there was not found on any of the islands 
they visited, any place apppropriated for religious rites, 
it would perhaps be going too far to declare, that the 
people of Pelew had absolutely no idea of religion. — In- 
dependent of external ceremony, there may be such a 
thing as the religion of the heart, by which the mind 
may, in awful silence, be turned to contemplate the God 

IT 



in 

©f Nature : and though unblessed by those lights which 
have pointed to the christian world an unerring path to 
happiness and peace, yet they might, from the light of rea- 
son only, have discovered the efficacy of virtue, and the 
temporal advantages arising from moral rectitude. The 
reader will, by this time have met with sufficient occur- 
rences to convince him, that the inhabitants of these new- 
discovered regions had a fixed and rooted sense of the 
great moral duties ; this appeared to govern their con- 
duct, glow in all their actions, and grace their lives. — 
Arising from such principles, we see them laborious, in- 
dustrious, benevolent. In moments of danger, firm, and 
prodigal of life ; under misfortunes, patient ; in death, 
resigned. And if, under all these circumstances, he can 
conceive that the natives of Pelew passed their existence 
away, without some degree of confidence, some degree of 
hope, I have only to say, his idea of mankind must wide- 
ly differ from my own. 

' " Superstition is a word of great latitude, and vaguely 
defined ; though it hath, in enlightened ages, been called 
the offrpsing of ignorance, yet in no times hath it existed 
without having some connexion with religion. — Now the 
people of Pelew, had beyond all doubt, some portion of it, 
as appeared in the wish expressed by the king, when he 
saw the ship building, that the English would take out of 
it some particular wood, which he perceived they had 
made use of, and he observed to them was deemed to be 
of ill omen or un propitious. 

*' They had also an idea of an evil spirit, that often 
counteracted human affairs ; a very particular instance of 
this was seen when Mr. Barker (a most valuable mem- 
ber in the English society) fell backward from the side 
of the vessel, then on the stocks ; Raa K@ok, who hap- 
pened to be present, observed thereupon, that it was ow- 
ing to the unlucky wood our people had suffered to re- 
main in the vessel, that the evil spirit had occasioned this 
mischief to Mr. Barker, 

" I n the passage from Pelew to China, somewhat was 
discovered in Prince Lee Boo, pretty similar to what is 
commonly called second sight ; — at the time when he was 
(as before mentioned) very sea-sick ,he said how much he 
was concerned at the distress his father and friends were 



Ill 

feeling, who knew what he was then suffering. The 
same anxiety operated on him, on their account, when he 
perceived his dissolution drawing near, as we shall have 
occasion to mention hereafter. 

" They certainly entertained so strong an idea of Divi- 
nation, that whenever any matter of moment was going 
to be undertaken, they conceived they could, by split- 
ing the leaves of a particular plant, that was not unlike 
our bulrush, and measuring the strips of this long nar- 
row leaf on the back of their middle finger, form a judg- 
ment whether it would or would not turn out prosperous : 
this was observed by Mr. M. Wilson, in his first visit 
to the king at Pclew ; and on inquiry was afterwards ex- 
plained to the English, by the linguist, as being done to 
discover if their arrival foreboded good or ill fortune.— 
It was noticed by several of our people, that the king re- 
curred to this supposed oracle on different occasions, par- 
ticularly at the time they went on the second expedition 
against Artingall, when he appeared to be very unwilling 
to go on board his canoe, and kept all his attendants wait- 
ing, till he had tumbled and twisted his leaves into a 
form that satisfied his mind, and predicted success. — Our 
people never observed any person but the king apply to 
this divination. 

" It is hardly probable but the fond anxiety of a parent, 
on giving up a son into the hands of strangers, who were 
to convey him to remote regions, of which he could form 
to himself but very imperfect notions, would, on so inter- 
esting a point, induce him to examine his oracle with un- 
common attention ; and it is as little to be doubted but 
that every thing wore, to his imagination, a prosperous 
appearance. Yet to evince the fallacy of his prophetic 
leaves, they certainly augured not the truth, nor present- 
ed to the father's mind even a suspicion, that the son he 
parted with he should see no more ! 

" On this subject I would further wish to bring back to 
the reader's recollection a few occurrences already no- 
ticed : — As Raa Kook, and others of the natives, were 
two or three times present when Captain Wilson, on a 
Sunday evening, assembled his people to read prayers 
to them, thev exnre<;sed nn snrnriitif nf wVinf- whq Hninrr 



112 

in which the English addressed that invisible God, whom 
they looked up to for protection ; and, however differ- 
ent their own notions might be, they attended the Eng- 
glish on these occasions with great respect, seeming de- 
sirous to join in it, and constantly preserving the most 
profound silence — the general never allowing the natives 
to speak a single word, and refusing even to receive a 
message from the king, which arrived at the tents during 
divine service. 

" The ceremony used by Raa Kook, after the funeral 
of his son, when he repeated something to himself whilst 
he was marking the cocoa-nut, and the bundle of beetle- 
leaves, which the old woman was to place on the young 
man's grave, had every appearancev>f a pious office; — 
and when he planted the cocoa-nuts, and some other 
fruit-trees, on the island of Oroolong, what he uttered in 
alow voice, as each seed was deposited in the earth, im- 
pressed those present as the giving a benediction to the 
future tree that was to spring from it. The king also, 
when he took leave of his son, said a few words, which, 
by the solemnity they were delivered with, and the re- 
spectful manner in which Lee Boo received them, indu- 
ced all our countrymen to conceive it was a kind of 
blessing. 

*' I must, in this place, add a circumstance that passed 
in conversation with Captain Wilson and Lee Boo, after 
he had been some time in England ; the former telling 
him, that saying prayers at church was to make men 
good, that when they died, and were buried, they might 
live again above (pointing to the sky ; Lee Boo, with 
great earnestness, replied — " All same Felew — Bad men 
stay in earth — good men go into sky — become very beaU' 
tiful^ holding his hand in the air, and giving a fluttering 
motion to his fingers. This surely conveyed a strong 
idea, that they believed the spirit- existed when the body 
was no more. 

*' After combining all these facts, and uniting them 
w ith the moral characters of the people, the reader is 
left in a situation to judge for himself (independent of 
Lee Boo's declaration) whether it is probable that their 
lives could be conducted with that decency we have seen, 
and their minds trained to so strong a sense of justice. 



113 

propriety, and delicacy, without having some guiding 
principle of religion. Thus much, at least, I think we 
may be authorized to assert. If all this was effected 
without it, it proves that the natives of Pelew had been 
happy enough not only to discover, but to be perfectly 
convinced, that Virtue was its own reward, 

GENERAL CHARACTER OF THE NATIVES. 

" I shall close this account of the Pelew islands with a 
few general remarks on the disposition and character of 
the natives. 

" The conduct of these people towards the English 
was, from the first to the last, uniformly courteous and 
attentive, accompanied with a politeness tliat surprised 
those on whom it was bestowed. At all times they 
seemed so cautious of intruding, that on many occasions 
they sacrificed their natural curiosity to that respect, 
which natural good manners appeared to them to exact. 
Their liberality to the English at their departure, when 
individuals poured in all the best they had to give, and 
that of articles too of which they had far from plenty 
themselves, strongly demonstrated that these testimonies 
of friendship were the effusion of hearts that glowed 
with the flame of philanthropy ; and when our country- 
men, from want of stowage, were compelled to refuse 
the further marks of kindness which were offered them, 
the entreating eyes and supplicating gestures with which 
they solicited their acceptance of what they had brought, 
most forcibly expressed how much their minds were 
wounded, to think they had not arrived early enough to 
have their little tributes of affection received. 

*' Nor was this conduct of theirs an ostentatious civili- 
ty exercised towards strangers. Seperated as they were 
from the rest of the world, the character of a stranger 
had never entered their imagination. — They felt our peo- 
ple were distressed, and in consequence wished they 
should share whatever they had to give. It was not 
that worldly munificence, that bestows and spreads its 
favours with a distant eye to retribution — Their bosoms 
had never harboured so contaminating a thought — No ; 



114 

the, love of man to man. — It was a scene that pictur- 
ed human nature in triumphant coloring — And, whilst 
their liberality gratified the sense, their virtue struck the 
heart ! 

" Our people had also many occasions to observe, that 
this spirit of urbanity operated in all the intercourse the 
natives had among themselves. The attention and ten- 
derness, shewn to the women was remarkable, and the 
deportment of the men to each other mild and affable ; 
insomuch that, in various scenes of which they were 
spectators, during their stay on these islands, the English, 
never saw any thing that had the appearance of contest, 
©r passion : every one seemed to attend to his own con- 
cerns, without interfering with the business of their 
neighbour. The men were occupied in their plantations, 
in cutting wood, making hatchets, line, or small cords : 
or some in building houses or canoes ; others in making 
nets and fishing tackle. The fornling of darts, spears, 
and other warlike weapons, engrossed the attention of 
many more ; as also the making of paddles for their 
boats, the fashioning of domestic utensils, and the pre- 
paring and burning the chinam. Such as had abilities 
to conduct any useful employment were called by the 
natives Tackalbys ; of this class were reckoned the peo- 
ple who built, or inlaid the canoes ; such also were those 
who manufactured the tortoise shell, or made the pot- 
tery. 

" As industry, however zealous, must be slow in pro- 
ducing its purpose, unaided by proper implements, and 
labour rendered extremely tedious from this deficiency, 
yet, in regions where such advantages are denied, we 
do not find that the ardor of attempting is abated. A 
steady perseverance, to a certain degree, accomplishes 
the end aimed at ; and Europe hath not, without reason, 
been astonished at the many singular productions import- 
ed from the southern discoveries, so neatly and curiously 
wrought by artless hands, unassisted but by such simple 
tools as serve only to increase our surprise, when we see 
how much they have effected. Every man, by his daily 
labour, gained his daily sustenance : necessity imposing^ 
this exertion, no idle or indolent people were seen, not 
even among those whom superior rank might have ex- 



115 

ciTiptcd ; on the contrary, these excited their inferiors 
to toil and activity by their own examples. The. king 
himselt was the best maker of hatchets in the island, 
and was usually at work whenever disengaged tVom mat- 
ters of importance. Even the women shared in the com- 
mon toil ; they laboured in the plantations of yams, and 
it was their province to pluck out all the weeds that shot 
up from between the stones of the paved causeways. — 
They manufactured the mats and baskets, as well as at- 
tended to their domestic concerns. The business of 
tatooing was also carried on by them ; those who entered 
this employment were derjominated Tackalbys arthiel, 
or female artists — Their manners were courteous, 
though they were far from being of loose or vicious dis- 
positions ; — they in general rejected connections with 
our people, and resented any indelicate or unbecoming 
freedom with a proper sense of modesty. 

" In such scenes of patient industry, the years of fleet- 
ing life passed on ; and the cheerful disposition of the 
natives fully authorized our people to suppose, that there 
were few hours of it either irksome or oppressive. They 
were strangers to those passions which ambition excites — 
to those cares which affluence awakens. Their existence 
appeared to glide along like a smooth, undisturbed 
stream ; and when the natural occurrences of life ruffled 
the surface, they possessed a sufficient portion of forti- 
tude to recover soon its wonted calm. Their happiness 
seemed to be secured to them on the firmest basis ; for 
the little which Nature and Providence spread before 
them they enjoyed with a contented cheerfulness ; nor 
were their bosoms habituated to cherish wishes which 
they had not the power of gratifying. And it will not 
surely be denied, that in civilized nations the error of a 
contrary conduct exhibits, among the inactive, many me- 
lancholy, repining countenances; whilst it prompts more 
daring and uncontroled spirits to aim at compassing 
their views by injustice, or rapine, and to break down 
the sacred barrier of society. 

" From the general character of these people, the reader, 
I should conceive, will be disposed to allow, that their 
lives do credit to human nature ; and that, however un- 

tntnrerL hnwpvpr nninfnrmprl. ♦Virir mMnners nrf^sent an 



interesting picture to mankind. We see a despotic gov- 
ernment without one shade of tyranny, and power only 
exercised for general happiness, the subjects looking up 
with filial reverence to their king ; and, whilst a mild 
government and an affectionate confidence, linked their 
little state in bonds of harmony, gentleness of manners 
was the natural result, and fixed a brotherly and disinter- 
ested intercourse among one another. 

''I am well aware, that in the expedition against Pelelew, 
the destroying the houses and plantations of the little isl- 
and belonging to it, which the natives, through fear, 
abandoned, as well as the killing those whom they cap- 
tured in battle, are both of them circumstances which will 
appear to militate against that humanity which, through- 
out this work, I have attributed to the people of Pelew. 
Respecting the first, though the landing in an enemy's 
country, and spreading devastation and distress, is by no 
means a practice new in the annals of history, political 
necessity qualifying the measure, yet in these regions it 
seemed also to militate so much against their accustomed 
maxim, never to take an enemy by surprise, but to give 
previous notice of a meditated attack, that I am strong- 
ly inclined to think this might have been a new art of 
war suggested to the king by the Malay favourite, as it 
totally contradicted that open generosity with which they 
at all times conducted hostilities. 

" As to their putting their prisoners to death, Raa Kook, 
on being censured for it by captain Wilson, said it had 
not been always so ; and, in assigning the reasons for 
being compelled to do it, seemed to shelter the proceed- 
ing under the plea of political necessity. 

*^The number captured in any of their battles must, from- 
their mode of engaging, be at all times very trifling. In 
the most considerable engagement our people witnessed 
at .Vrtingall, no Inore than nine were made prisoners, 
which the natives accounted a great many ; nor were 
these put to death in cold blood, it rather might be call- 
ed the close of the battle. It was generally the effect of 
unsubsided passion or revenge, the terminating blow be- 
ing, in most cases, given by some one who had lost a near 
relation, or friend, in the battle, or was himself suffering 



117 

under the pain of a wound. Situated, beside, so nearly 
as these islands were to each other, it was next to impos- 
Bible to detain their captives ; they had no prisons to con- 
fine them ; no cartel canoes to negotiate an exchange ; 
and going about the island freely, the lives of the sove- 
reign or his chiefs, were at all times assailable by any 
vinciictive spirit. They had, as the general told captain 
Wilson, inefTectaally strove to detain them as menial ser- 
vants. Therefore, revolting as the idea is, if they have, 
in this respect, adopted a maxim which prevails among 
the Indian tribes in America, and in the numerous states 
of Africa (though the number of lives sacrificed can ne- 
ver here be many) one hath only to lament that political 
necessity hath (in common with a multitude of other un- 
civilized countries) thrown a shade over these new-dis- 
covered islands. 

" It should be the caution of every writer to endeavour 
to disarm criticism, by meeting objections that may be 
made. After the good disposition which the people of Pe- 
lew have been seen to possess, it may possibly be said, they 
were addicted to pilfering when opportunity offered ; a 
censure which many, I believe, have thought has been 
too severely passed on the poor inhabitants of the south- 
ern ocean ; but in the Pelew islands, it was never done 
but by those of the lowest class; and whenever complaint 
was made of any thing being taken clandestinely away, 
the king, as well as his chiefs, considered it as a breach 
of hospitality, nor could their indignant spirits rest till 
the article purloined was searched for, and if found, res- 
tored. Should some eastern prince, magnificently deco- 
rated, accidentally, as he passed along, drop a diamond 
from his robe, and were a poor peasant (who knew how 
great an acquisition it was) pursuing the same tract, to 
see it sparkling in the dust, where is that resistance, that 
would go and leave it untouched ? A nail — a tool — or a 
bit of old iron, was to them the alluring diamond. They 
had no penal statute against petty larceny. They sought 
only the means of rendering easier the daily toils of life, 
and compassing with facility that which they imperfectly 
accomplished by unwearied perseverance ! And, I am^ 
confident the voice of reason will unite with me in assert- 



118 

ing, that they must have been more than men, had they 
acted less like men. Virtuous in the extreme would be 
deemed that country, where the conscience of no indivi- 
dual, in the cool moments of reflection, could upbraid 
him with a heavier transgression, than applying to his 
own use a bit of iron that lay before him ! 

" In the name^of humanity, then, let us judge with less 
rigor our fellow creatures ; and, should any one be dispo- 
sed, for such trivial failings, to censure the benevolent in* 
habitants of Pelew, that censure, 1 trust, for the sake of 
justice, will never be passed on them by those who live 
in civilized and enlightened nations — for such must be too 
well convinced of the inefficacy of the best digested laws, 
and the inability of their own internal police to restrain 
the vices of mankind, by observing, that all which pru- 
dence can revolve, wisdom plan, or power enforce, is fre- 
t^uently unable to protect their property by night, or their 
persons at all times, even under meridian suns. They will 
reflect, that every bolt and bar is a satire on society ; and 
painfully recollect, that it is not the daring plunderer 
alone they have to guard against ; they are assailable un- 
der the smile of dissembled friendship, by which the 
generous and the confiding are too often betrayed into a 
situation beyond the shelter of any protecting law ; a 
Wound which, perhaps, more than any other, hath tortured 
the feelings of sensibility. 

" Waiting, therefore, that the long expected aerea, when 
civilization, science, and philosophy, shall bring us to a 
more confirmed practice of real virtue, it becomes us to 
view with charity those errors in others, which we have 
not yet been able to correct in ourselves. 

" If the enlightened sons of Europe, enjoying the full 
blaze of advantages unknown in less favoured regions, 
have hitherto made so slow an advance toward moral 
perfection, they are surely passing the severest censure 
on themselves, if they expect to find it in a happier manner 
approached by the dark and unfriended children of "the 
Southern World !" 



119 



As a contrast to the foregoing most interesting account 
of the conduct of savages to christians, we will intro- 
duce a recent account of the conduct of christians to 
shipwrecked christians, without any comment. 

Wreck and Plunder of the Invereness. 

Particulars of the wreck and plunder of the Inverness, 
Captain Lcith, in the Shannon river, loaded at Limerick 
with a cargo of provisions, on account of Mr. E. D. 
Hanmer's contract with the Victualling Board, and 
bound to London, 

Fro7n Captain Miller of the Police^ to Mr. Spaight^ 
Merchant^ Limerick. 

Kirlrusii, Feb. 24, ISIT. 

** Dear Spaight^ — As I am now in possession of most 
of the particulars of the wreck of the Inverness, I shall 
detail them to you as follows : 

She went on shore on Wednesday night the 19th in- 
stant, taking Renevaha for Carrigshold, and would have 
got off by the next spring tide, had the peasantry not 
boarded and rendered her not sea-worthy, by scuttling 
her, and tearing away all her rigging; they then robbed 
the crew of all their clothes, tore their sails, which they 
made bags of to carry away the plunder, and then 
broached tierces of pork and distributed the contents to 
people on shore, who waited to convey them up the 
country. The alarm having reached this place on 
Thursday, a Serjeant and twelve of the police w^ere sent 
down with the chief constable at their head, and they 
succeeded in re-taking some of the provisions, and se- 
curing them, driving the mob from the wreck. The po- 
lice kept possession of what they had got during the night, 
but very early on Friday morning the people collected in 
some thousands, and went down to the beach, where 
they formed into three bodies, and cheered each other 
with hats off, advancinc: with threats declaring that they 



what had been taken from them, and of the arms of the 
police : the police formed into one body, and showing 
three fronts, endeavored to keep them at bay, but in 
vain ; they assailed them with stones, sticks, scythes, and 
axes, and gave some of our men some severe blows^ 
which exasperated them so much, that they were under 
the necessity of firing in self-defence, and four of the as- 
sailants fell victims, two of whom were buried yester- 
day. 

During their skirmishing, which began about 7 o'clock, 
one of the men mounted, was dispatched to this town for 
a reinforcement, when Major Warburton in half an hour, 
wdth twenty cavalry and a few infantry mounted behind 
them, left this, and in one hour and a half were on board 
the wreck, and took twelve men in the act of cutting up 
the wreck : one of them made a blow w ith a hatchet at Ma- 
jor Warburton, which he warded off, and snapped a pis- 
tol at him, the fellow immediately threw himself over- 
board, when Troy charged him on horseback, up to 

the horse's knees in water, and cut him down. The fel- 
lows then flew in every direction, pursued by our men, 
who took many of them, and wounded several. Nine 
tierces of pork have been saved. Her bowsprit, gaff, and 
spars, are all gone, with every stitch of canvass, and all 
the running rigging. The shrouds are still left. Two 
anchors and their cables are gone, and even the ships 
pump. A more complete plunder has seldom been wit- 
nessed. Yesterday the revenue wherry went down to Ri-' 
nevaha,and returned in the evening with the Major and 
a small party with thirty five prisoners, who now are all 
lodged in Bridewell. The women in multitudes assem- 
bled to supply the men with whiskey to encourage them. 

Nothing could exceed the coolness of Baefice and 

his party, who certainly made a masterly retreat to the 
slated store at Carrigahok, where I found them. He and 
Fitzgerald were wounded, but not severely ; Fitzgerald 
had a miraculous escape, and would have been murder- 
ed, but was preserved by a man he knew, from Kerry, 
who put him under his bed, &c. 

(Signed) J. MILLER. 



121 



CHAPTER Iir. 



Jl concise and consolatory view of the infinite wisdom and 
goodness of God, manifested in his plan of salvation, for 
the comfort of the oppressed, the conviction of the oppres- 
sor, and the counter -action of the evils produced by man 
in society. 

•• Thou great first cause, least understood, 
Whom all my thoughts confined, 
To know but this, that thou art good, 
And that myself am blmd." 

I have, in the antecedent pages, exhibited a small spe- 
cimen of the powerful and prevalent moral corruptions 
in civil society, in order to shew their fatality and not 
their magnitude, which would be a thing impossible. 
No pen can paint, no tongue express, no imagination can 
conceive their magnitude and universality. I have also 
attempted to display a few of the causes which have pro- 
duced those destructive effects. The remedy would be 
the easiest thing in life, if the civilized and christianized 
supporters and defenders of popular corruption, error, 
and disorder, only possessed the benevolent dispositions of 
Louverture, Abba ThuUe, and the good Samaritan, those 
honest children of nature, whom they pity and despise. 
The thing might be done by simply removing the cause 
which produces so many mountains of human misery, 
and the eflfects would, of course, cease : but to hope or 
expect this phenomenon will take place (while those who 
fatten on corruption and live in splendour on the misery 
and crime of their fellow creatures possess their present 
dispositions,) is equally visionary as to expect a stone, 
contrary to the laws of gravity, to asccBd the sky sponta- 
neously, or a lion to relinquish his mangled prey by 
preaching to him. I have, therefore, not the most dis- 
tant hope of being useful to either the pr oud supporters, 
or the wilfnllv blind and servile vir.tiiti.-. of nur nnfnrinnu 



122 

quirer after truth, the honest and intelligent child of mis- 
fortune, who S3es and feels the effects, and is almost rea- 
dy, with Voltaire, to impeach God as the cause of the 
disorders of society ; who sincerely desires light to dis- 
tinguish between truth and error, and is disposed to 
do the thing that is right with the grateful and pure mo- 
tive of pleasing God only ; to. such characters, in the pre- 
sent and in future generations, this book will be more 
precious and profitable than apples of gold in pictures of 
silver, notwithstanding its desultory composition ; and 
though it will be hated and despised, like its poor author, 
by the children of darkness, yet sure I am, God will use 
means to have it re- published and disseminated even by 
its enemies, so that it may fall into the hands of some of 
the honest victims of our corrupt manners, to whom it 
will prove a blessing. Yes, sure I am, without any man- 
ner of doubt, that the gracious and the great first cause 
will never suffer one single soul (who sincerely loves the 
truth and who wishes to do it) to live and die the victim 
of error and delusion. 

I will beg leave to illustrate this by facts which speak 
louder than the most sublime speculative reasoning. Per- 
haps few children ever endured more misery in receiving 
a corrupt education, or w^s more completely corrupted 
thereby than myself. I verily believed that every one 
that did not believe as I did would most assuredly be 
damned; and I believed, among other absurd errors, 
that he would be doing God a service who would put a 
heretic to death, i, e. one who refused to believe the dog- 
mas that were carefully inculcated upon my juvenile . 
mind. Indeed I would then" have kindled the fires of 
the inquisition, which I now would extinguish with my 
blood. In one word, I was a complete fanatic. How- 
ever, as I wish, as much as possible, to forgo the severi- 
ty of personal animadversion, or to point the finger of 
scorn at any sect, for they have all been oppressors when 
they had the power, and feeling, as I now do, a friend to 
every sect and every man, their pride and prejudice to 
the contrary notwithstanding, 1 am, therefore, resolved 
to avoid personalities as much as possible. However, I 
will mention an anecdote which occurred in my youth. 
This day 26 years ago. or about that period, I happened 



123 

to forget that it was Good Friday. I, of course, eat 
meat that day, and never found my mistake till two days 
after, when I was in the greatest distress on account of 
committing this mortal sin in not keeping my reckoning 
more correct. I was at that time sailing along the coast 
of South America, and it was about eighteen months af- 
ter I was seperated from my bigoted parent and precep- 
tor by a remarkable interposition of Divine Providence ; 
still i was so completely under the influence of prejudice 
that, for this supposed crime, I tortured myself in the 
most dreadful manner by way of doing pennance, and 
thus making an atonement for my supposed offence, 
while, at the same time, for real sins I felt no compunc- 
tion, and literally, like many ancient Jews and modern 
Christians, strained at a knat and swallowed a camel. 1 
was about 17 years of age at the period of which I speak. 
The foregoing instance of error and superstition is only 
one out of thousands, and I mention it in order to en- 
courage the doubting child of calamity to trust, with un- 
shaken confidence in God, for protection and deliverance 
from all his enemies, and from the worst of them all, the 
potent prejudices of a faulty education ; without this last 
deliverance, all will be abortive. To know ourselves is 
super-eminent wisdom : to know our God is supreme 
delight ; neither of which can we possibly do while we 
are the slaves of pride and prejudice. I would advise 
him to be still before his God, and to listen to the intel- 
lectual voice of his Holy Spirit ,* if he will thus act, and 
trust in the Divine clemency, the scales will fall from the 
eyes of his mind, and he will see things, in the natural, 
moral, and physical world, as they truly are, and not as 
they appear to be. Then, instead of complaining with 
Voltaire, with me he will worship and adore ; let him 
with me have no patron but God, no sect but mankind 
collectively ; but if he will have himself attached to a sect, 
he should beware of their passions and prejudices. Asso- 
ciations seldom seek after truth, but rather build their 
superstructure of moral rectitude upon tradition, like the 
Jews. Behold the various sects in Jerusalem ; did they 

obey our adorable Saviour when he preached his excel- 
\ont^ n,^c,»^^i «.^ »v.^*^ ? ivT^ r^^A ^.^,7 1 ^_ 



124 

most mild and merciful exhortations, and lastly bj^ fright- 
ful calamity, in vain ; and when no other alternative ro 
mained, he destrayed them and their city with^ signal 
destruction ; not, however, before the cup of their cor- 
ruption was full, and running over. And I would ask 
v,hat has the pure and heavenly truths of the Gospel, 
written in a book and published profusely among the sons 
of Europe, what have they produced by the various sects, 
each in succession, when they become powerful ? I an- 
swer, they have produced sin, misery, misfortune, and 
murder. Designing villians, monarchial and episcopal, 
have made truths so pure, so peaceable, so charitable, so 
equal, so friendly and humane, the auxiliaries of hell : 
yes, they have made them a pretext for the establishment 
of all the moral corruptions, and the consequent mise- 
ries I deprecate. They have been even made the parent 
of the tyrannies of Europe,'the ravages of Asia, and the 
slavery of Africa. And what, I would ask has been the 
face of the best and brightest men, who had the boldness 
to oppose the torrent of popular corruption in every age, 
by the simple exhibition of the naked truth ? To tell 
their numbers, and innocence, and the unexampled cru- 
elty they endured by the hands of those who had the 
word religion always playing upon their lips, would be 
too shocking for humanity to hear. Belzebub himself 
would shudder at the dreadful tale. 

We will pass by, with astonished silence, the rage of 
Christians against each other, and merely mention the 
penury and persecution of a few of the brightestand best 
of the heathen philosophers. Behold Homer, the first of 
poets, doomed to beg his bread ; Socrates, the first of 
philosophers, was, by a court of justice, condemned to 
death by poison for teaching truth, and opposing the 
idolatry of Athens; Pythagoras, the first teacher of the 
true system of astronomy, and the first of philanthropists, 
was burned alive for his knowledge and virtue by the un- 
grateful Crotonians j Plato was doomed to slavery, 
though the wisest and best author of his age ; and Sene- 
ca, the first of moral philosophers, was bled to death b\' 
his own pupil. Even the republics of Greece and Rome, 
and Asa Minor, and others I might mention, though cele- 
Un-^ted once for their virtue, were the confederated murder- 



125 

ers of their fellow creatures, the systematic plunderers of 
their neighbours, and the traitors and tyrants of mankind. 
Methinks I hear the intelligent, but unfortunate victim of 
our moral corruptions exclaim, with a sorrowful heart, 
*' Alas ! why is it that in all nations and among all deno- 
minations, this cruel disposition is found in man to slaugh- 
ter man. Why, oh ! why are not all men like the amia- 
ble Louverture, or the hospitable Abba Thulle ? Why 
will they not, like them, enjoy the happiness of beneli- 
cience, which is so precious and so free for all to parti- 
cipate ? They very well know that all happiness that ^is 
genuine consists in promoting the happiness of others, 
with a single eye to please God alone. This only is pure 
virtue ; whatever is done from sinister motives, however 
excellent in itself, is spurious before God, who searches the 
heart and knows the imagination of the thoughts. Oh ! 
how can any man be so unreasonable as to think it pos- 
sible to find peace in giving pain to another. My very- 
heart weeps blood to find myself placed in a world of 
monsters, not men ; and I am tempted to believe there 
is too much truth in the picture Voltaire has drawn of 
the miseries of humanity, or I am ready to exclaim with 
Brutus, after the loss of the battle of Phrasselia, " Alas ! 
virtue, 1 worshipped thee as a god, but I find thee to be 
an empty shade. '^ These, I know, are your thoughts, 
O ye intelligent children of misfortune, and I well know 
by experience they cause you to feel- the most painful 
sensations. To answer which, I would observe — When 
we view the disorders of mankind we should be very 
guarded least we become guilty of a crime of which we 
are cautioned by the source of virtue, namely, *' Judge 
not least you be judged, for with the same measure you 
mete it will be measured to you again.'' I'hough in all 
nations and gener:ciions there have l)een cruel men, there 
have been also benevolent men. There are many good 
men in Christendom, who ever)' day lament their frailty 
through the first Adam, and look and long for deliverance 
therefrom through the second Adam. Yet-mind ! all and 
each of these in every part of the world, Cliviistian and 
Pagan, are humane and charitable, for this is the first law 
inculcated by the Holy Spirit; and whoevt'r has not been 



126 

vain, his periodical attendance at silent or shouting meet- 
ings to the contrary notwithstanding. 

" The most excellent and honourable character which 
can adorn a man and a Christian, is acquired by resist- 
ing the torrent of vice, and adhering to the cause of God 
and virtue against a corrupted multitude. It will be 
found to hold, in general, that they who, in any of the 
great lines of life, have distinguished themselves for 
thinking profoundly and acting nobly, have despised pop- 
ular prejudices, and departed, in several things, from the 
common ways of the world. On no occasion is this 
more requisite for true honour than where religion and 
morality are concerned. In times of prevailing licen- 
tiousness, to maintain unblemished virtue and uncorrup- 
ted integrity ; in a public or a private cause, to stand 
firm by what is fair and just, amidst discouragements and 
opposition ; disdaining all compliance with public man- 
ners, when they are vicious and unlawful ; and never 
ashamed of the punctual discharge of every duty to- 
wards God and man ; — this is what shows true greatness 
of spirit, and will force approbation even from the de- 
generate multitude themselves. ' This is the man,' ^their 
conscience will oblige them to acknowledge) 'whom we 
are unable to bend to mean condescensions. We see it 
in vain either to flatter or to threaten him ,* he rests on a 
principle within, which we cannot shake. To this man 
we may, on any occasion, safely commit our cause. He 
is incapable of betraying his trust, or deserting his friend, 
or denying his faith.' 

" It is, accordingly, this steady inflexible virtue, this 
regard to principle, superior to all custom and opinion, 
which peculiarly marked the characters of those in any 
age, who have shone with distinguished lustre, and has 
consecrated their memory to all posterity. It was this that 
obtained to ancient Enoch the most singular testimony of 
honour from heaven. He continued to * walk with God' 
when the world apostatized from him ; he pleased God, 
and was beloved of him, so that, living among sinners, 
he was translated to heaven without seeing death : * Yea, 
speedily was he taken away, lest wickedness should have 
altered his understanding, or deceit beguiled his soul.'— 



127 

When Sodom could not furnibh ten righteous men to 
save it, X.ot remained unspotted amidst the contagion. 
He lived like an angel among spirits of darkness ; and 
the destroying flame was not permitted to go forth till 
the good man was called away, by a heavenly messenger, 
from his devoted city. When * all flesh had corrupted 
their way upon the earth,' then lived Noah, a righteous 
man, and a preacher of righteousness. He stood alone, 
and was scofted by the profane crew. But they, by the 
deluge, was swept away, while on him Providence con- 
ferred the immortal honour of being the restorer of a bet- 
ter race, and the father of a new world. Such examples 
as these, and such honours conferred by God on them 
who withstood the multitude of evil doers, should often 
be present to our minds. Let us oppose them to the 
numbers of low and corrupt examples, which we behold 
around us : and when we are in hazard of being swayed 
by such, let us fortify our virtue by thinking of those 
who, in former times, shone like stars in the midst of 
surrounding darkness, and are now shining in the king- 
dom of heaven, as the brightness of the firmament, for 
ever and ever." — Blair, 

God beholds, here and there, through the whole earth 
and in all ages, individual imitators of his Divine phi- 
lanthropy, such as my African prince, captain Wilson's 
Pelew king, and our adorable Redeemer's good Samari- 
tan. For the sake of these, and such like precious jew- 
els, individually, God bears salong and so patiently with 
the black ingratitude of mankind collectively. If there 
were ten truly virtuous persons in Sodom, God would 
certainly have spared the city for their salce ; but he can 
and will bring good out of evil. Was it not so he would 
not sufl"er it to exist a moment longer in his creation. He 
permitted the thieves to rob and wound the traveller on 
the road between Jerusalem and Jerico ; by this adven- 
ture the good Samaritan had an opportunity to practice 
the most excellent virtue, because it was disinterested, 
without ostentation, or hope of remuneration ; and while 
God beheld with indign uion the inhumanity of the Le- 
vite and the Priest with the badges of religion on their 
breasts, he also beheld with admiration the philanthropy 



.128 

religious man. Thus the loss of the Antelope gave, 
Abba Thaile an opportunity to practice the most exalted 
virtue, without a tuicture of ostentation or selfishness ; 
the account of which is sufficient to humble the towering 
pretentions to sanctity of many modern professors who 
wear the badge of religion on their backs and heads, and 
even on their tongues, while the selfishness of their daily 
conduct demonstrates that their hearts and those of Lou- 
verture and Abba Thulle are as diflferent as the frigid 
and torrid zones. Such high and pompous professors of 
religion, like thunder, are all rattle and no reality, while 
the humble and unassuming possessors of true virtue are 
like the sun, silently producing the most excellent fruits 
and effects, to the glory of God and benefit of man. 

Although the duties of religion are as plain as ABC, 
yet there is a stupendous mystery, infinite philanthropy, 
and unutterable ingenuity, manifested in the Divine plan 
of salvation, which the angels of heaven will never be able 
to ascertain or sufficiently adore and admire. But it will 
be asked by the inquiring child of misfortune, who sick- 
ens at the prospect this wretched world presents to his 
view, " Did not God see, from all eternity, what a mise- 
rable set of wretched criminals man would become when 
made free and intelligent ? Why then has God made a 
creature so capable of corrupting and tormenting his own 
self and his own species ?" This objection has been rai- 
sed a thousand times as a knockdown argument, not in 
justification, but condemnation of the ways of God to 
man. In answer to which, I would observe, that if God 
saw that man would fall, he at the same time also saw, in 
the exhaustless treasures of his own benevolence, an an- 
tidote which would not only restore that which was lost, 
but would, out of partial evil, produce everlasting good. 
Again, the source and sum-total of goodness, mercy, and 
truth, according to his characteristic munificence, created 
man with a freedom and intelligence capable of partici- 
pating the plenitude of his Divine liberality, and contem- 
plating, with supreme delight and celestial gratitude, his 
sovereign beauty, at once simple and sublime, ancient 
and new. Now every reasonable man must be convinced 
that God could not create a being capable of so high beati- 
tude, even in his own glorious image, benevolent likeness, 



129 

and happy in the communication of his Holy Spirit, un- 
less he made him free and, of course, fallable. Ht saw 
that all might, and that some would fall. But, as I said 
before, he also had a remedy provided, namely, our glo- 
rious Redeemer : blessed be his holy name ! who has re- 
covered by his obedience and death, what Adam lost by 
his disobedience and fall. But I would ask, if man had 
not fallen from his prime vial rectitude, how many mil- 
lions of mercies in God, and virtues in man would have 
remained an eternal secret, nor ever would have been 
displayed to the admiring eyes of billions of superior be- 
ings who inhabit the innvunerable systems of creation ? 
If evil never had been, goodness could not have been ex- 
ercised as it now is, and be greatly glorified by contrast- 
ing it with evil ; how could charities exist between man 
and man, and pardon and penitence exist between man 
and God, had man never fell from his pristine beauty. 

To delineate these endearing and delightful contrasts 
and harmonies, would require more than angelic elo- 
quence ; what I mention herein is, therefore, like a drop 
of water compared to the ocean. God uses a thousand 
ways and means to call his rebellious creatures to their 
uwn happiness — and often does he hold out his benevo- 
lent hand to save them while sinking in sorrow, though 
they spurn it from them, yet he holds it out to them 
again. Yes, so great is the ingratitude of man, that he 
will take more pleasure in injuring one who has greatly 
befriended him, than one who has been his enemy. I 
have no doubt this book is one means God graciously uses 
for the comfort of the unfortunate, for I may say with the 
strictest truth, that calamity is its author. For was I not 
taught by my own miseries to pity the miserable, never ne- 
ver would I have written such a book as this. God sends 
misfortune to remind us of the fleeting nature of all earthly 
things ! enemies, that we may trust in no man ! afflictions, 
that we may be constrained to look to him, who is alone 
able and willing to relieve. All our sufferings, whether 
of body or mind, are intended by our good God to ac- 
complish the most valuable purposes. He takes no de- 
light in our sufferings ; he pities, he compassionates his 
creatures who love and wish to please him, and would in* 



130 

pensibly necessary that we should pass through this state 
of miseiy, and be tried, proved, and prepared for a future 
state o£ supreme happiness. 

Thus we see if God permitted the fall of man, (and in- 
deed he could not prevent it without destroying his li- 
berty and will) he has also, by a process or revolution in- 
finite, amazing, and divine, produced from this partial evil 
infinite and eternal good, and millions of virtues, amities, 
and charities, which angels view with wOnder and delight, 
and which would have remained in eternal oblivion were 
it not for the fall of man. I believe there are quadrilions 
of reasonable beings in the different systems which com- 
pose the universe, who receive intelligence, beauty, and 
loveliness, from the contemplation of the sovereign beauty! 
and being always obedient to the eternal laws of order, 
their celestial pleasures are continually accumulating as 
they continually admire \^ith supreme gratitude, the infi- 
nite power, wisdom, and goodness of their Almigh- 
ty Creator. God, without any manner of doubt, can 
impart to his creatures of all grades, an intelligence, 
a beauty, a power, and information as different from 
each other, as a mole is from a mule. Superior 
beings, perhaps, can see and admire the architecture 
of Jehovah as much superior to our first rate naturalists 
and astronomers, as they can more than animalculas in 
the tube of a plant. Great indeed are the powers and 
properties which God can impart to his obedient crea- 
tures, who receive and reflect his beauty as the moon 
does the sun ; but no longer than they continue obedient; 
for the greatest gifts may be prostituted to the most un- 
worthy purposes, according to the pious or perverse dis- 
position of the agent. Witness Lucifer, who though 
powerful, is also miserable, because he is malevolent; but 
God, who is infinite in power, is supremely and eternally 
happv because he is the source of benevolence ; he is, in 
one word love itself, and cannot impart any measure of real 
happiness to any of his creatures, but such as dwell in his 
love ; hence, as we nourish and practice a benevolent spirit, 
we promote our own happiness ; and, on the other hand, as 
we nurture a malevolent spirit, we in an exact ratio, are the 
authors, promoters, and supporters of our own'misery and 
woe. The love of God flows in one boimdless torrent to 



131 , 

all men, and his light enlightens every man that cometU 
into the world, and his Holy Spirit is calling from time to 
time, every man in all nations and denominations thus : 

*^ LEARN FROM LOVE TO YOU ALLjTO LOVE ONE ANO- 
THER." But few, comparatively, will be melted to peni- 
tence by his love ! will be enlightened by his light ! or 
taught by his Spirit ; of course they are miserable exactly 
as they are malevolent and disobedient, while the others 
are happy as they are benevolent and obedient, like the 
unlettered Abba ThuUe, in whos^ breast was opened a 
little heaven. While in the breasts of millions of the sons 
of affluence, who pity and despise this child of nature, v 
and call him a barb^irian, there are hells in minature 
opened by pride, hatred, envy, malice, and selfishness, 
with their train of evils which constitute the very nature of 
hell in the soul of man, and change the very face of na- 
ture, by rendering it a prison instead of a paradise. Thus 
God does all he can, consistently with his attributes and 
our free agency^ to render all his creatures happy, holy, 
and heavenly. 

I think this reasoning is conclusive, and I hope will an- 
swer my purpose, which is to convince the doubtful 
child of misfortune, that God only afflicts him to-day in 
order to reward him to-morrow ; his doubts must be re- 
moved before he can possibly be benefitted by his calami- 
ty. If he looks upon God as Voltaire did, he cannot 
love him above all things ; and without this love there 
can be no true happiness. God can call by affliction his 
ungrateful creatures to seek his face and favour ; but to 
force them to do this is a thing impossible. Hear the 
word of the Lord to the highly favoured son of David— » 
'* Solomon, my son, seek thou the God of thy fathers, and 
serve him with a perfect heart, for he searcheth the heart 
and knows the imagination of the thoughts ; if thou seek ' 
him he will be found of thee, but if thou forsake him he 
will cast thee off forever." God's yoke certainly is very 
easy, and his burden very light, namely : gratitude to God 
and affection to man; to love all, to injure none, no not even 
an innocent insect. For to loveGod above all, and our neigh- 
bours as ourselves, is the essence of religion ; on these twa 
commands hang all the law and the prophets. Now the 



132 

yet he can use every possible way to allure, to win, to woo 
us to our happiness. His Spirit speaks thus tome in the in- 
ward of my soul, and if my unfortunate reader would but 
humbly listen, he would most assuredly hear the same 
endearing words addressed to him or her — " What could 
I do for you more than what I have already done ? I 
give you all good things to enjoy, and only require a 
grateful heart in return ; I prohibit you from the enjoy- 
ment of none of my benefits that is necessary for you ; 
my commandments are mild and moderate, namely, that 
you should be grateful to God, kind to man, merciful to 
the brute, and not to injure even an innocent insect by 
careless cruelty, nor yourself by intemperance ; till you 
obey these, my primary commands, you cannot, in no case, 
enter my kingdom of happiness ; and if you continue to 
violate them in your intercourse with your fellow crea- 
tures, you violate my immutable laws of order ; you 
change the earth, which I made a terrestrial paradise for 
your sake, to a loathsome dungeon; and I can, in no case, 
avoid measuring in an exact ratio to you, what you have 
measured to others. How often have I (as I now again 
do) appealed to your own conscience, to your reason, to 
your common sense for a justification of my ways to 
man ? How often have I offered to open my kingdom of 
love in your souls? but you would not even listen, much less 
obey my kind solicitation, or my gentle reproof. I pity, but 
cannot help you in any other way ; I can and do attract 
you, if not forcibly at least most powerfully, to turn from 
the foolish forms, fashions, and ceremonies of cruel man ; 
and seek your happiness and tranquility in your merciful 
God. They offer the shadow, and are followed, and 
their voice obeyed with a cringing servility; while I, who 
call you to real and eternal felicity, am treated with dis- 
respect and disregard ; and while your wills and affec- 
tions turn from my divine influence, arid the light of my 
unchangeable truth, you, the following moment, lend art 
attentive ear to the foul and false suggestions of evil spi- 
rits, and give yourselves up to their operation ; hence the 
darkness and error, the sin and misery, pain and sorrow, 
falsehood and folly, pride and hatred, cruelty and cupi- 
dity, with which the earth abounds! and to cap the cli- 
max of your criminalty you ungratefully and wickedly 



133 

accuse me as the author of your own misery and mis- 
chief, and say my ways are not equal and just towards 
man. But those who yield up their wills to my influence, 
see, with new eyes, the harmonies, beauties and benefits 
of the universe, the operations of nature, the manifesta- 
tions of grace, and the universality ot my love ; and being 
enlightened by the glorious Son of Righteousness, they 
see their own sin and deformity, and are filled with hu- 
mility, and our goodness, and beauty, and are clothed 
with gratitude ; and this glorious light shines brighter 
and brighter to the perfect day, and their love to God 
and man accumulates from youth to age, because they 
see and will for ever see new beauties, harmonies, and 
benefits in his divine majesty and his majestic architec- 
ture, which beggars description. Those who open freely 
and of their own choice, the door of their disinterested 
affections, and permit the King of glory to enter in, and 
submit to his mild government, and love him with all 
thtir understanding and their strength, (for God is deli- 
cate in love, and cannot endure a divided, much less ii 
sinister heart) they, by an inconceiveable participation of 
his nature, become glorious in his glory, wise in his 
wisdom, strong in his strength ; in one word, they pos- 
sess the object of their supreme affection, as their eternal 
portion and property, who is himself the proprietor of 
the universe." This is the language of truth, and cal- 
lous must that ungrateful heart be, which remains un- 
moved by penitential emotion, while perusing these en- 
dearing, these reasonable, these natural, these scriptural 
expostulations of the spirit of truth, which the reader, 
no doubt, will hear spoken by an inward voice to his 
f^yfn heart, if he will take the trouble to shut this book 
and, in humble contemplation, listen five minutes to his 
infallible criterion within, whose intellectual voice has 
never perhaps, been regarded for five minutes this 
nfty years. There is no sentiment more erroneous, ab- 
surd, and rediculous, than that which is preached and 
ablished in a thousand different forms by our elegant, 
eloquent, and eminent Doctors of Divinity, namely, that 
" 7}ian is not a free agenty If this assertion is true all 
my argumentation to justify the ways oi God to man is 



134 

is most assuredly false, blasphemously false. An -- 
prejudiced child must see its fallacy. Is it not an ins 
to common sense to suppose that God could exalt i *ca 
without liberty or will, like so many sticks and stones to 
so high a state of beatitude ? Surely it is, and all ^he 
promulgators of error, and advocates of false doctrine, 
which absolutely makes God a tyrant, will find it so one 
day. It really distresses and grieves me to know that 
men, whose genius and literary acquirements are as 
much superior to mine, as one is to a hundred, and w^o 
are, withall, as amiable in their manners, and asexemp^'i- 
ry in their morals as any of the clerical tribe. I say it 
really grieves me, to find such men the warm promulga- 
tors and supporters of this fatal doctrine. I intended 
not to have one controversial word in my book, and to 
have carefully avoided giving umbrage to any individual, 
or individual sect. Should any readers, therefore, who 
warmly supports the above doctrine, which I call fatal, 
peruse these simple strictures, I humbly hope they will 
not be offended at what they may consider acrimony in 
my phraseology, especially when I assure them, I would 
be sorry to offend, much less injure my worst enemy. 
How then can I wilfully offend those I never saw, nor 
expect to see, till we meet in another world, where we 
will all clearly see as we are seen, without an intervening 
cloud of error between. Finally, as I believe there are 
many of the sentiments in this performance which will 
clash with the opinions of many readers, notwithstanding, 
I have suppressed many interesting arguments in order to 
avoid giving offtnce, by exhibiting personalities, for I 
well know, in order to profit, I must endeavour to avoid 
offending ; this consideration has prohibited me from ex- 
hibiting a great many observations to shew, that bigotry, 
superstition, and intolerance, are extending to an alarm- 
ing degree in civilized society, political and ecclesiasti- 
cal. May I not, therefore, hope that the purity of my 
motives in saying what 1 have said against notorious er- 
ror, will plead my excuse ; and that my readers will be 
so candid as to give my arguments a fair hearing before | 
they consign them to oblivion as spurious. For if it is 
the worst of crimes to buy life by selling sacred truth, it I 
must be a double crime to sell it to gratify our petulence,| 
and sacrifice our peace. 



135 

.It will, before I conclude this chapter, suggest a few 
i;l,. e simple, but sublime truths, without intentionally 
giving offence to any sect or any man. It is possible to 
gain the most excellent knowledge without studying 
books, sciences, or sermons. The independent child of 
nature may soar sublime upon the wings of contempla- 
tion, and turning his back upon the false theology of in- 
terested priests, and the fallacious logic of ambitious and 
avaricious authors, he may hear the lessons of eternal 
t; jth in the sliades of obscurity without the medium of 
words or bounds. This inspiration is not like the enthu- 
siasm of some sectarians, who, by their eloquence, ani- 
mate the animal passions, heat the mind, and agitate the 
body. The voice of the divinity within brings the soul, 
to an humble calm, hushes to silence the vainreasonings of 
superstitious man, and inculcates this most important 
truth. — '* Know, child of mortality, that in order to gain 
the approbation of God you must imitate his veracity, 
his goodness, his munificence, for he can only look upon 
his own benevolent Itktness wiih approbation. And 
no intellectual being can find real happiness any where 
but in the celestial sunshine of his smiles of complacency ; 
and this supreme honour and felicity he grants to no one 
but those who seek to resemble him in his benevolent 
characteristic, or his imitable perfections, from the pure 
motive of pleasing him alone. And the man that 
nurtures these motives and desires, though beset 
with ills, covered with rags, and seated on a dutighill, 
God wHl delight to dwell with him even there ; he will 
make himself known to his humble, lowly heart, 
and his intellectual word, sweeter than the songs of an- 
gels, will be wings to raise him to the third heavens, 
where he will see and hear things like St. Paul, not law- 
ful to utter." Methinks I hear the intelligent child of 
misfortune say, while tears of penitential sorrow steal 
from his eyes, and trickle down his cheeks : " I now see 
33 I never saw before the fallacy and criminality of my 
doubts and complaints against Providence. In five mi- 
nutes I have been taught more consolatory truths by lis- 
tening to the voice of my intellectual monitor, than I 
have by listening to the voice of my minister for twenty- 



135 

the peculiarities, and inhumanity of princes, priests, sects^ 
and parties, are the source of many of our moral corrup- 
tions. The priests, who were establrshed at first to make 
men good, have made a trade of their vocation, and reli- 
gion itself an outward show. Hence the ignorant fall into 
gross superstition, wits become impious sceptics, and the 
intelligent arraign the eternal wisdom for the evils they 
see on earth. Thus every one form a doctrine of their 
own, however erroneous, while the infallable teacher waits 
knocking at the door of our hearts, till his locks are wet 
with the dew of the night. I have, also, for along time 
refused him entrance into my worthless heart, but I will 
refuse no more. I now clearly see how reasonable it is 
for the sovereign will of Jehovah to be also the will of 
his dependent creatures, and the rule of our actions. I 
now see he can love none of his creatures with the love 
of complacency, but those who resemble himself ; it is 
this resemhlence which constitutes the beauty and excel- 
lence of all intelligent beings." 

This view you have of the true christian theology is 
equally instructive and consolatory. Even when we see 
a glimpse of his sovereign beauty in the romantic sce- 
nery of the flowery valley, the spacious landscape, and 
the towering n«)untains, we should let the love of the 
original be the sole motive of admiring the picture. 
Ho\v*eVer sectarians may laugh at these sentiments, which 
Vvlll be at open hostility with the hypocrisy and duplicity 
of the age in which we live, it is certain, that when vir- 
tue is only practised, not for its own amiableness, but to 
be seen of men ; vice also, on the other hand, will be, as 
it unhappily is, practised by all ranks and conditions in 
the community, when unseen by man, or when fear of 
punishment does not deter the delinquent. Thus is civil 
society weakened, corrupted, and demoralized. But 
notwithstanding the present great and glaring corruption 
of society, it is possible, as it was in all former ages, even 
including the iron age, for the few sincere admirers of 
the sovereign beauty, to find their sure and safe refuge 
in his bosom, and their supreme happiness in submitting 
to his will, obeying his intellectual word without any 
whys or wherefores, and contemplating his infinite per- 
fections. But to do this, we must withdraw from al- 



137 

outward objects, and as we thus draw oft' our affections 
irom all transitory objects, our love for him who is the 
admiration and delight of angels and all superior beings, 
becomes more exalted, more generous, more delicate. 
We then see the baseness of our former self-love, which 
caused us to go to meeting, profess the height of sanctity, 
and attend to all the peculiarities of a sect, profess reli- 
gion with our coats, our hats, our hair, our dialect, in the 
street as well as in our social worship, and all the time 
cot know the etymology of the word, much less expe- 
rience the least particle of true religion. By degrees we 
see more and more, as the eye becomes more and more sin- 
gle, the deceitfulness of the human heart, and the duplicity 
of our self love, which so long and so forcibly stimulated 
us to practice virtue out of vanity, and attend to the out- 
ward forms of religion, to gain the praise of man, little 
suspecting the treachery of our own hearts, while in the 
darkness of error. For when the eye is not single, and 
our motives not pure, the whole body is full of darkness ; 
though we should fast, pray, and preach, give all 
our goods to feed the poor and our bodies to be burned, 
had the faith of the prophet Elijah, and the eloquence of 
the angel Gabriel. It is astonishing how fc\r professors 
may go in what they vainly believe is the direct road to 
heaven, and not take one single step thither. I know it, 
by a sad experience oi near twenty years delusion, though 
I then professed to be the chief of saints, and really 
thought myself such, but naw 1 know myself to be the 
chief of sinners, and abhor myself every day and repent 
as in dust and ashes. I mention this that the reader may 
know I speak from experience ; but I must say, though 
in darkness, I really was sincere, yet, alas ! ofttimfes have 
I, through the error and prejudice of education, strained 
at a knat and swallowed a camel, as already mentioned. 
I might particularize a great many instances of this la- 
mentable truth relative to myself, my colleagues, and co- 
patriots, but this would give ofTeiiCt , and ti [give unneces- 
sary offence to any man, friend or foe, is i.s totally unad- 
missable for me to do, as to make a popular profession 
of sanctity, either verbally or by the cut of my coat, the 
shape of my hat, the cant of my manners, or the peculia- 
ritv of mv nhraseoloirv. When I see these tbinc's I cannot 



138 

help exclaiming, with one of old, " vanity of vanities, all 
is vanity." True virtiffe shuns applause, and seeks soli- 
tude ; does good from the pure love of good, vrithout any 
hope of recompense, and, if possible, incognito ; in one 
word, from the pure motive of pleasing God alone. I 
know all denominations will call this a visionary hypo- 
thesis ; but they calling it so will not make it so ; nor they 
calling error truth, and believing it such, will not make it 
such. I know there have been men in all ages who, 
though tainted with the pride and prejudice of opinions 
peculiar to their sects, were good and did good,* but I 



* I have been careful (almost to a fault) not to give oflFence to 
readers who see different from me. From this consideration I 
have refused to exhibit many a notorious and deleterious error in 
common life. I have mentioned neither the name of individuals, 
nor individual sects, in order to point out their errors, and where 
the errors themselves have answered this purpose, they have 
been of the least fatal kind, and the individuals and sects have 
been the least exceptionable. I wil. now, with distinguished de- 
ference, (in order to consolidate and demonstrate the above as- 
sertion) mention only one error in one of the best T)f men in the 
age, and vihich he considered a virtue as well as the sect to 
which he belonged, the most respectable, and numerous one in 
Christendom, and which has pr>.duced the best and brigiitest 
men, such as a Francis Xavier, a Fent Ion, a De Renty, and the 
one we presume to point out as erroneous in one particular, 
namely, the pious Thomas a Kempis. But, says one, how dare 
you call that sect the most respectable, when it is well known 
they have been the most blind and bl )ody persecutors ? I would 
ask, in return, and has not other sects, which might be named, 
been also blind and bloody persecutors when they had the power 
to be such ? Most assuredly they have, though they cannot, or 
rather, will not see it. Fnr my part I see all sects with ati 
equal, impartial, unprejudiced eye; I see their beauties as well 
as their deformities. I really love them all, and virtually beh-ng 
to them all, because I can see more than two or three in each 
of them, who convene wi hout bigotry or guile, in their Saviour's 
came, and h-. is in the midst f them, notwithstanding their curi" 
ous Hud different modes of worship : that is, if they keep, the gol' 
den rule in and out of meeting w/M the pure vienv of pleasing 
him alone. But it was not so with me when I was a sectarian?; 
then I viewed my own sect all beautiful, and the rest all def6r- 
mity ; my own I loved and worshipped, the others I pitied and 
despised. But to return to >he pious aad ir-genious Thomas a 
Kernpis, I would simply ask any reasonable man, whether this 
holy liionk had not been better himself, and done the good he 



139 

must say if they had been happUy digested of their pre- 
judices, they would have been better themselves, 
and done the good they did better. But to exhibit these 



did do better, if he had imitated his Saviour, the apostles, and 
Richard Reynolds, in going about doing good to his wretched 
fellow creature instead of burying himself in a cloister all his 
long life > Well, but see what a g'od book he wrote there ? and 
see aslo what a great book Jchn Bunyan wrote, who never was 
there and d'd not even knew how to read till his wife learned 
him. This Kennpis rught to have done, and not to have left the 
other undone. To prove this truth I have only to transcribe the 
words of the source of the truth, namely, our gracious Redeemer 
who inculcated it by example as well as precept. Hear what 
he say s : 

** VV hen the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the ho- 
ly angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory. 
And before him shall be gathered all nations; and he shall sepa- 
rate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep 
from the goats: and he shall set the sheep on his right hand, 
but the goats on the left. Then shall the King say unto them on 
his right hand, Come ye blessed of my Father, inherit the king- 
dom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I 
was an hungered, and ye gave me meat : I was thirsty and you 
gave me drink : I was a stranger, and ye took me in : naked, 
and ye clothed me : I was sick, and ye visited me : I was in prison, 
and ye came unto me. Then shall the righteous answer him, 
saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungered, and fed thee ? or 
thirsty, and gave thee drink •* when saw we thee a stranger, and 
took thee in } or naked, and ch thed thee } or uhen saw we thee 
sick, or in prison, and came unto thee ? And the King shall an- 
swer, and say unto them, verily I say unto you, in as much as ye 
done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done 
it unto me. Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, 
depart from me ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the 
devil and his angels. For 1 was an hungered, and ye gave me no 
meat : I wasthirsty, and ye gave me no drink : I was a stranger, 
and ye :ook me not in : naked, and ye clothed me not : sick, and 
in prison, and ye visited me not Then shall they also answer him, 
saying. Lord, when saw we thee an hungered, or athirst, or a 
stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minis- 
ter unto thee ? Then shall he answer them, saying, verily 1 say 
unto you, in as much as ye did it not to one of the least of these, 
ye did it net to me. And these shall go away into everlasting^ pu- 
nishment: bftt the righteous into life t;ternal." 

VVt will conclude this note with a sketch of this good man's 
lift, whtjse book 1 keep as ■<*. pocket companion. 

"Thomas was called a Kt-mpis. from a little village of that 



140 

impKjrtant truths to those who are wilfully blinded by pre- 
judice, and the servile parasites of men clothed with a 
little brief authority, is like shewing a blind man a variety 
of colours, that he may judge of their beauty. Indeed I 
fear it will be labour in vain to delineate the nature of 
true religion and virtue, because they have their coun- 
terfeits every where, and because the false kind is more 
congenial to the sentiments and agreeable to the taste of 
the generality of professors ; they embrace the last in 
preference to the first, and hate the author who honestly 
deprecates the one and inculcates the other. However, 
1 flatter myself that some few readers, by seeing the lov- 
liness of the virtue I advocate, may first admire, then 
embrace, and lastly practice it. Encouraged by this hope, 
and a certainty of pleasing God at all events, while my 
motives are pure, I will proceed to make a few more ob- 
servations to consolidate what has already been said. 

Vice, therefore, must always meet its re-action. With 
the same measure you mete, it will be measured to 
you again, either here or hereafter, is a truth which 
was, is, and always will be verified. Thus David, 
though he watered his couch with his penitential tears, 
and admired the sovereign beauty with an ardent 
love unequalled in his age;, and wrote an excellent 
book in justification of the ways of God to man : yet we 
find the sword never departed from his house, because of 
his ingratitude and inhumanity to his faithful soldier 
Uriah, So is it with those who come savingly to the light 
of life ; in this world they discover the enormities of their 
self-love, which made them refer their antecedent virtue 
to themselves, which was the blackest ingratitude to God 

of oar Lord, 1380. His parentage and fortnne were mean ; at 
thirteen y«rars old, he began his studies, and about nineteen, be- 
took himself to a Monastry ot Augustine-Monks: about five and 
twenty, he took the habit of that house and order. There he 
continued for the space of seventy years, particularly enninent 
for his piety, humility, diligent study of the Holy Scriptures, aus- 
terity of life, moving eloquence in discourse, and extraordinary 
zeal in prayer. For his person, he was a middle stature, of a 
strong browM complexion ; a lively piercing eye, and a sight so 
gf).)d, that though he 1 iboared much under other infirmities of 
old a.g' , yer he was neve: reduced t© the use of spectacles. He 
died July 25, 1471, in the ninety-second year of his age.'* 



141 

and a usurpation of his rights. The remembrance oi' 
these secret iniquities gives them inexpressible pain, but 
being disengaged from the self-love which produced these 
spurious fruits and eft'ects in themselves, and in society, 
and which was an intervening cloud between them and 
their creator, they now rise above themselves, shake off 
all earthly affections, and soar sublime on the wings of 
heavenly contemplation, and behold indeed a glimpse of 
the sovereign beauty. Thus the beautiful dragon-fly, 
when it ascends from the sepulchre of its foul progenitor, 
a dead maggot on a stinking dunghill, it loaths its former 
state, and flics with its four transparent wings to regale 
itself on the nectar, and enjoy the fragrance of the flow- 
ery meadows and the vernal groves. So great, and 
greater still, is the contrast between the proud professor 
and humble possessor of true religion and virtue. 

What an interesting sight, which commands the atten» 
tion of admiring hosts of angels. An enlightened peni- 
tent, bewailing his former selfishness, and lifting up his 
eyes, streaming with tears of gratitude, to the immutable 
beauty, and looking and longing with a soul full of light, 
love, and pure desire, not only to view him with that un- 
prejudiced and disinterested eye, with which alone he can 
be viewed, but also to be united to him by an everlasting 
union, endearing and congenial as the branch with the 
vine. . Then, and not till then, will the soul bring forth 
not the shadows of virtue, but the virtues themselves^ 
Then being, in truth, the child of heaven, it will be her 
super-celestial delight to do good to man, with the pure 
motive to please God alone,, and in imitation of his bene- 
ficence, she will always, as much as possible, while be- 
stowing the benefit, hide the benefactor nor will suffuse the 
countenance of the child of misfortune with confusion,^ 
and wound his susceptible imagination with grief, while 
contributing towards his relief, as is too often done by 
the professors of religion and moral philosophy. Yes, it 
has grieved me to mv hearts core, to reflect how often the 
intelligent child of misfortune, whose philanthropy redu- 
ced him to want and misery, has his refined feelings 
wounded by the ostentatious parade of charity, bestowed- 
with a supercilious nod, by the rich booby, a sanctimoni- 
.'*!i«t frnwn hv the nrnn 1 H<^votee. and a sarcastical reflec« 



142 

tion by the minister in his sacerdotal garments. Surely 
if any thing can forcp the reluctant frown of heaven on 
earth, it must be such unfeeling charity. Little do such 
men know of the blessedness of doing good from the pure 
love of good, with the view of pleasing God only, and 
the delight which attends the sincere endeavour to honor 
and glorify him by imitating his divine philanthropy, from 
the same grateful and generous motive. But it is utterly 
impossible for us to see, much less do, these most su- 
blime and celestial truths, before our hearts are purged 
af prejudice and selfishness. Till then we never can 
contemplate the sovereign beauty and his supreme archi- 
tecture with gratitude and admiration ; nor indeed can 
we see that the doctrines and the laws of nature are 
worthy of God, much less be enamoured with the beau- 
ties of eternal truth. 

Had I only to convince the erroneous judgment of 
many of my readers, I should feel satisfied that I already 
justified the ways of God to man to their satisfaction and 
conviction, and proved to a demonstration that our God 
would never have suffered the reign of partial evil, was 
it not in order to produce everlasting good ; and that he 
only afflicts us to-day with the view of rewarding us to- 
morrow. But, alas f it is not the infidelity of their rea- 
son, but the ingratitude of their hearts to the most excel- 
lent of all beings, which I find is the formidable barrier 
that I cannot remove, nor even God himself, against the 
consent of their own free wills ; for says the old adage — 

** Who is convinced against his will 
Is of the same opinion still." 

I well know that it is exceedingly hard even to con- 
vince the judgment perverted from youth to age, and 
taught to consider truth error, and error truth, by a false 
and fatal education, which transforms objects and places 
them in a wrong light. But, hard as these prejudices 
are, they are not invincible ; it is diflicult, but not im- 
possible to surmount them, when the consent of the sel- 
fish will is once gained. When this victory is once at- 
chieved, the triumph of virtue will soon follow, both in 
the Christian and the Pagan, the sage and the savage, for 
the Spirit of Christ is always ready, in all places, through 



143 

the whole earth, and at all times, to enlighten the humble 
penitent, the melting mind, to see the intrinsic value of 
these truths, and to attract powerfully the man whose do- 
cile will is to do the will of the Christians Jehovah, alias 
the heathens Jove. 

We will take the liberty to close this chapter with the 
following pathetic potm of the benevolent and ingenious, 
but unfortunate Scottish bard, Robert Btirns^ as it beau- 
tifully shews that there is a recompense in reservation for 
the innocent man, who is unjustly and cruelly oppressed 
by his tyrannical neighbour, if not here, most assuredly 
hereafter. But it may be asked, where will the poor 
patient, docile, innocent horse, who was tortured to a lin- 
gering death by civilized man, where will he meet a re- 
compense, as nothing but cruelty and hunger was his por- 
tion in this world ? To answer this interrogation, I must 
beg leave to transcribe a quotation from my '' Flowers of 
Literature," page 324, third edition. The first edition was 
published in 1805. 

" Faith is the act of man, as well as the power of God. 
They that come humbly to the feet of Christ, and ask it, 
shall not ask in vain. They who rely upon his merits as 
repenting criminals, who do as well as say and watch as 
well as pray, are most assuredly in the narrow way to 
heaven. But alas ! little of this faith which works by 
love and purifies the heart, is to be seen cither in church 
or state. God, in the plenitude of his goodness, has ac- 
commodated us with a paradise (if I miiy so speak) to 
dwell in, carpeted with roses beneath, and sprinkled with 
golden stars above us ; but we have metamorphosed it to 
a slaughter house. Millions of the human, and billions 
of the brutal creation, are tortured and slaughtered every 
year, especially young children. The view we have given 
of man's cruelty, in our historical compendium, when 
compared to what God views every day, is like compar- 
ing one to a thousand. But will he always suffer villainy 
thus to prosper ; the man who says yes, must be either a 
knave or a fool. I have no more doubt that there v. ill 
be soon a termination to the present state of the world, 
than 1 have of my existence. And I am equally confir 
dent, that God will amply recompense innorent sufferers, 
both animal and human, for their sufferings in this world. 



144< 

Reader, do not smile at the novelty of this notion, which* 
you may consider premature. Surely, if you could see 
the thousandth part of the sufferings of the brute crea- 
tion, and a throb of pity palpitated in your breast, you 
would, if in your power, recompense them yourself. And 
are you more just and merciful than God ? Sure I am, 
innocent babes and brutes had never entered this world, 
to suffer, had there not been a recompense in reservation 
when they left it. A few days ago, with ineffable de- 
light, I recognized the sentiments of that learned and 
pious divine, the Rev. John Wesley, which tally with my 
own as expressed in my " Excellency of Virtue." I 
will take the liberty to transcribe a few of his thoughts, 
hoping they may prove a blessing to the philanthropic 
reader. They read thus : " Away with vulgar prejudi- 
ces, and let the plain word of God take place. They 
' shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into 
glorious liberty :' even a measure, according as they are 
capable, of the liberty of the children of God." 

" To descend to a few particulars. The whole brute 
creation will undoubtedly be restored, not only to the vi- 
gour, strength, and swiftness which they had at their cre- 
ation, but to a far higher degree of each than they ever 
enjoyed. They will be restored, not only to that mea- 
sure of understanding which they had in paradise, but to a 
degree of it, as much higher than that, as the understand- 
ing of an elephant is beyond that of a worm. And what- 
ever affections they had in the garden of God, will be res- 
tored with vast increase, being exalted and refined in a 
manner which we ourselves are not able to comprehend. 
The liberty they then had will be completely restored, and 
they will be free in all their motions." 

My sentiments are the same now as twelve years ago, 
relative to man co-operating with God in working out 
his own salvation, and that even then God is entitled to 
«ll the glory, and we are but unprofitable servants. As 
also relative to the animal creation finding a sure recom- 
pense in their merciful creator for the unparrallelled bar- 
barity they, though innocent, useful, and docile, receive" 
from the hands of cruel man. The brute, the man, and 
angel, I believe, through all eternity, will be ascending in 
a regular progression in the scale of being, so that, how- 



145 

ever high, intelligent, and glorious the archangel is this 
moment, the period will arrive, when the poor, honest, 
virtuous man will be as high as he is now, though the 
archangel will be still on the ascending scale, and yet 
will ever see new beauties expanding in the sovereign 
beauty. We will now introduce that pathetic poem, en- 
titled : 

" MAN WAS MADE TO MOURN." 

"When chill November's surly blast 

Made fields and forests hare, 
One ev*n\ng, as I waud'rtd forth 

Along the banks of Ayr, 
I spy'd a man, whose aged s!:ep 

Seem'd weary, worn witii care; 
His face was furrow'd o'er with years, 

And hoary was his hair. 

Young stranger, whither wand'rest thou ! 

(Began the rev'rend sage ,) 
Does thirst of wealth thy step constrain, 
, Or youjhful pleasure's ragei* 

Or haply, prest with cares and woes, 

I'oo srK>n thou hast began. 
To wander forth, with me, to mourn 
The miseries of man. 

The Sun that overhangs yon moors, 

Out-spreading far and wide, 
Where hundreds labour to support 

A haughty lordling's pride ; 
I've seen yon weary winter-sun 

Twice torty times return ; 
And ev'ry time has added proofs, 

Ihat man was made to mourn. 

O man ! while in thy early years. 

How prodigal of time ! 
Mispending all thy precious hours, 

Thy glorious youthful prime ! 
Alternate follies take the sway: 

Licentious passions burn ; 
Which tenfold force gives nature's law, 

That man was made to mourn. 

Look not alsne on youthful prime. 

Or pianhorxl's active might : 
Man then is usef. ' to his kind. 



146 

But see him on the edge of life, 
With cares and sorrows worn, 

Then age and want, Oh! ill-match*d pair 
Show man was made to mourn. 

A few seem favourites of fate, 

In pleasure's lap carest ; 
Yet, think not all the rich and great 

Are likewise truly blest. 
But, Oh ! what crowds in evVy land, 

Are wretched and forlorn. 
Thro' weary life this lesson learn, 

That man was made to mourn. 

Many and sharp the num*rous ills 

Inwoven with our frame I 
More pointed still we make ourselves. 

Regret, remorse, and shame ! 
And man, whose heav*n-erected face, 

The smiles of love adorn, 
Man's inhumanity to man, 

Makes countless th©usand.s mourn ? 

See yonder poor, o'erlabour'd wight, 

So abject, mean, and vile. 
Who begs a brother of the earth 

To give him leave to toil ; 
And see his lordly /eZ/ow ivorm 

The poor petition spurn. 
Unmindful, tho' a weeping wife, 

And helpless offspring mourn. 

If I'm design'd yon lordling's slave. 

By nature's law designed, 
Why was an independent wish 

E'er planted in my mind } 
If not, why am I subject to 

His cruelty, or scorn ? 
Or why has man the will and powV 

To make his fellow mourn ? 

Yet, let not this too much, my son. 

Disturb thy youthful breast; 
This partial view of human-kind 

Is surely not the last i 
The poor, oppressed, honest man, 

Had never, sure, been bora, 
Had there not been some recompense 

To comfort those that mourn ! 

O Death ! the poor man*s dearest friend, 
The kindest and the best ! 



]4.7 

Welcome the hour my aged limbs 
Are laid with thee at rest I 

The great, the wealthy, fear thy blnu 
From pomp and pleasure tern ; 

But, Oh! a blest relief to tho^c 
That wear5 -laden mourn '" 



CHAPTER lY. 

The author^s experience briefly delineated as a further justi^ 
fication of the ways of God to man. 

*• Let the world their virtue boast their works of righteousness-, 
I, a wretch, undone and lost, am freely saved by grace ; 
Other titles I disclaim, this, only this, is all my plea, 
I the chief of sinners am, but Jesus died for me." 

I intend to say but little about my experience or tra- 
vels, in order to leave room for more useful matter. In- 
deed in most biographies there is too much written rela- 
tive to the big letter I, myself, and too little said for God. 
For my part, 1 have nothing good to say of myself, but 
every thing good to say of God. But it is not only peo- 
ple who write their own memoirs who dwell too much on 
the big letter I, and too little on the little monosyllable 
we. Their biographers also not only fall into the same 
errors, but too often introduce lengthy, fulsome, and dis- 
gusting eulogiums, where nothing but animadversion is 
due. But this substitution of falsehood for truth is a 
common thing in civil society. I recollect seeing a com- 
pilation entitled " a biographical account of eminent pious 
women, who were a support and honour to the Christian 
religion." But on viewing the characters exhibited by 
the religious compiler, I found them all to be queens, 
duchesses, countesses, ladies of honour, or ladies of 
wealth ; the memoirs of one poor pious woman was not 
among them. But this is only one instance in thousands, 
where even religion is used by interested men as a fan to 



148 

kindle the pride of the sons of venality and daughters of 
grandeur from a spark to a flancie, as if the tinsel of roy- 
alty, and the pride and pageantry of courts were not suf- 
ficient to answer this deleterious purpose. But to return 
to my brief delineation of my past experience, and too 
brief it cannot be, at least for my restrospection ; for the 
remembrance of my past ingratitude to the best of beings, 
and his multiplied mercies, favours, forbearance, and 
compassion, makes me often realize that interesting 
prayer used every morning in the Church of England, 
viz. ; '"''The remerrihrance of my sins^ Lord^ is a grie- 
vous burthen to me intolerable to be borne.'^'* But the sin 
of ingratitude, which I formerly did not consider a sin, I 
now see outweighs all my other sins put together. Per- 
haps there is iiot a man in a million who has more cause 
to deprecate the present popular mode of education than 
myself; it has been the fruitful source of the principal 
sins and miseries of my past life. My mother, the kind- 
est earthly friend I ever had, died when I was live years 
of age, when my miseries and misfortunes commenced. 
It may be answered, she certainly could not have much 
friendship or feeling for you, when she sent you and your 
cradle out of her house as soon as you were born, to be 
nursed by the wife of one of your fathers domestics. I 
answer, this unnatural conduct was the natural fruit of 
the corrupt manners of the age, and my fathers pride and 
want of affection for his children. I believe she was as 
tender as most mothers : I always found her so while 
blessed With her protecting embrace. When she died I 
was sent to school to a religious brute, who faithfully and 
literally obeyed all the week the doctrine preached by his 
parish priest, on Sunday from this well known text, viz : 
" Sparethe rod you spoil the child.'''' Alas! what did I not 
suffer at school ; it was only a word and a blow, and the 
blow was sure to come first; in one word, I was so stupified 
with continual beating, thnt 1 could not learn. At school, 
i constantly suffered flagellation, often till I was in a gore 
of blood, and at home almost starvation, not out of stin- 
giness, but with the view of making me delicate in my 
person. So I spent the sad morning of my life. My 
corporeal sufferings were great, but the intellectual mise- 
ries I afterwards endured, by means of the false doctrine 



149 

mcalcated carefully upon my juvenile mind, was much 
greater : the very thought ot which sickens me to the 
present moment, and makes the involuntary wish arise in 
my mind to die, and leave a world so full of error, preju- 
dice, and cruelty, behind. I suffered this martyrdom till 
1 was sixteen years of age : by this time I was perfectly 
bigoted to my religion, so called. In about ten years I 
did not learn as much as I would have done, with hu- 
mane preceptors, in ten months. JNIy natural disposition, 
which is tender and compassionate, was so completely 
metamorphosed that I look back with horror upon instan- 
ces ot barbarous cruelty, exercised towards innocent and 
helpless animals by myself, in my youth. And is it any 
wonder ? I was made to feel that my preceptors were 
cruel tyrants, and I was taught to believe that God was a 
hundred thousand fold more cruel ; that-he would even 
send little children to hell, to be tormented to all eternity 
for the neglect of their parents in not having them baptis- 
ed before their dissolution. 

This is only a small specimen of the erroneous doc- 
trines I firmly believed ; and so blind and bloody 
minded was I, that I could, with a clear conscience, have 
assassinated any heretic that would have spoken against 
them. In one word, I was completely corrupted by the 
practical cruelty of my scholiastic preceptors, and the 
cruel iloctrines of my ecclesiastic teachers. However, 
when about sixteen years of age, God, by a gracious in- 
terposition of his providence, seperated me from them 
all ; but alas ! I carried their intellectual ))oison away 
with me, which has been the parent of a thou and 
real crimes which I disregarded, while I have shed ten 
thousand penitential tears over imaginary ones, while tra- 
velling to three quarters of the globe. Twenty seven 
years, wandering through a wilderness of calamity, have 
scaicely been sufficient to eradicate from my mind that 
fatal poison. A folio volume could not contain an ac- 
coimt of my rebellion against God, and its re action ; 
cite misfortune has always lollowed another, as the faith- 
ful messengers of God to call me to my sure refuge in 
his own bosom. He suffered my parent and prtceptor 
to be cruel, that the cord which bound my tender affec- 
tions to my kindred and country might be more easily 



ISO 

broke ; and he sufFered me to be so grievously contami- 
nated by error, that when I saw the loveliness of his 
truth I might the more highly admire, love, and appreciate 
it from the contrast ; he suffered me to be cheated by 
fraudful men, and they chiefly religious, out of a hand- 
some fortune, because he well knew that it would have 
proved fuel to the native pride and theoretical prejudice 
of my deceitful heart ; he has doomed me to be a fugi- 
tive, without a friend, and an exile on the face of the 
earth all the days of my life, as a re-action for my ingra- 
titude, a preventative from falling again into disorder, a 
stimulus to make me seek my happiness in a grateful in- 
tercourse with himself alone, which the prosperity and 
friendship of this world would most assuredly preclude. 
But above all, that I might learn from my own miseries 
to pity the miserable, and to comfort them, which is the 
primary object of this book, with the view of pleasing 
God alone. - He has, I now clearly see, done all things 
well for me, though I have, times without number, mur- 
mured and repined against his gracious dispensations, 
the utility, wisdom, and mercy of which, angelic elo- 
quence can never display. The only thing I ever did in 
my life I feel a sure witness in my own mind is pleasing 
to him, was the composition and publication of the 
**Rights of God ;"* the naked truths therein, as I expect- 
ed, has made me a host of the most deadly foes, and at 
least helped to leave me without a single friend. My 
life has been threatened ; I have been falsely sworn 
against, and so grieviously calumniated by the professors 
of religion, that it is only of God's counteracting mercy 
that I have a place to lay my weary head, or a crust of 
bread to eat. This ingratitude from those for whose hap- 
piness T have sat up many a cold night and wrote thou- 
sands of pages," is also a blessing, and has a direct tendency 
to wean me more and more from this faithless world, and 
to stimulate me more and more to seek my happiness in 



♦This book is intended as a second part of " Rights of God ;'* 
and if I should live to publish a new edition of that work, this 
shall be its auxiliary, vvith this title — "Rigkts of God, written 
for the benefit of man, part the 2nd, or the Pieasures^of Contem- 
plation,** &c, &c 



151 



God alone, as I now prove the truth of Ovid's ren^ark, 
viz. 

'♦ All hopes of happiness on earth are vaui." 

Two years ago I published the filth edition of my 
" Rights of God," — 4000 copies. At that time I saw 
and felt tlie mighty weight of my salutary and necessary 
calamity ; but I did not see and feel, as I now do, its 
blessedness, 1, therefore, in that edition, transposed, in 
imitation of Shubert, a poem which implied a complaint 
against Providence. Oh ! reader, if you knew what a 
complaining, murmuring, ungrateful wretch I have been, 
you would be constrained forthwith to lift up your hands 
and eyes to heaven and wonder and adore the patient 
mercy of its Almighty sovereign. I will transcribe that 
poem as a literary abortion from "Rights of God," page 
344, and will place by its side, as its counteraction, and 
the present language of my inmost soul, Addison's grate- 
ful hymn. 

LAMENTATION. 1 GRATITUDE. 



How j^reat my grief and anguish, 

Of every liope bereaved' 
yow oft 1 sigh and languish ! 
How by my friends deceived ! 
Still wishing-, still desirini^, 
To peace in vain aspiring-, 
A thousand tears 1 shed. 
In nightly tribute sped, 
In nightly tr.bute sped. 

My own frail heart betraying, 
And friends no longer true ; 

No tmiles my face arraying. 
No heart so fraught with woe. 
So pass'd my life's sad morn- 

No heavenly joy's returning: 
Alas ! now all around 
Is dark and cheerless found. 

Ah * why did nature give me 

A heart so soft, yet frail ! 
A heart to pain and grieve me, 
At ills that men assail ! 

At others ills ;hus wailing. 

And my own frailty feeling, 

With tender anguish fraught, 



When all thy mercies, O! my 
God! 
My rising soul surveys. 
Transported with liie view, I'm 
lost 
In wonder, love, and praise. 

O how shall words, with equal 
warmth. 
The gratitude declare. 
That glows within my ravished 
heart ? 
But thou canst read it there. 

Thy Providence my life sustained. 
And all my wants redrest, 

When in the silent womb I lay. 
And hung upon the breast.' 

To all my weak complaints and 
cries, 
Thy mercy lent an ear. 
Ere yet my feeble thoughts had 
learn'd 
To form themselves in pray*r. 

Unnumber'd comforts to my soul 



152 



1 



Aii ! what is nature's beauty 

To me, whose weary breast 
Can find on earth no pity. 
Nor friend whereon to rest ; 
But God is true and faithful, 
' Tho' men are most deceitful ; 
I'll trust him to the end, 
Tho' ills on ills descend. 

Ere long, perhaps, ray sorrow 

Shall find its welcome close; 
Nor distant far the morrow, 
That br'mg-s the wish'd repose ; 
When death with kind em- 
bracing", 
Each bitter anguish chasing. 
Shall mark my peaceful doom, 
Beneath the silent tomb. 

Then cease my heart to languish, 

And cease to flow my tears, 
Tho' nought be here but anguish. 
Kind heaven will end my cares. 
In my cold grave reposing, 
Life's sins and sorrows clos- 
ing. 
No more shall ills assial, 
No more my sins bewail. 



Before my infant heart conceived 
From whom those comforts 
fiow'd. 

When, in the slipp'ry paths of 
youth. 
With heedless steps, I ran. 
Thine arm unseen, conveyed me 
safe. 
And led me up to man. 

Through hidden dangers, toils, 
and deaths. 
It gently clear'd my way ; 
And throagh the pleasing snares 
pf vice. 
More to be feared than they. 

When worn with sickness, oft hast 
thou 
With health renew'd my face ; 
And, wlien in sins and sorrows 
sunk, 
Reviv'd my soul wiih grace. 

Thy .bounteous hand, with world- 
ly bliss. 

Has made my cup run o'er ; 
And, in a kind and faitliful friend. 

Has doubled all my store. 



When I transposed the above poem to suit niy case, per- 
haps there was not on -he f ice of the whole earth, a more 
miser?ible wretch than myself, and all owing to the re- 
mains of the poison of a false education on the mind. 
Alas what tongue can express the force of first impressions? 
1 saw excellent truths, and wrote and published them, 
with th^ certain expectation of raising myself a host of 
deadly foes, who, if they had me in Spain, would soon 
make me feel the fires of the inquisition. What they 
have done in this free coun.ry proves to me what they 
would do if they had me in Spain. I also well know, 
and knew if I wrote in support of popular error, to flatter 
folly, to support superstition, to please prejudice, or to 
vindicate some numerous sect, instead of truth, I would 
have made myselfmanyfriends, and accumulated riches ; 



153 

but wealth and life itself had lost all their charms 
with me, not because 

" I had no eye to mark my sufferings with a tear, 
No friend to comfort me, nor hope to cheer," 

but because a prejudice, riveted in youth to my mind, 
still remained, namely, that God, who I loved more than 
any other being, was offended with me every day for in- 
firmities which it was utterly impossible for me to avoid. 
My good genii told me, perhaps a hundred times, how 
easy and even pleasurable his injunctions were, namely, 
gratitude to God and sincere affection to man. I heard 
the intellectual voice, but would not believe contrary to 
the maxims of my youth ; I saw much truth, and 1 ad- 
mired and loved it; I saw much error, and detested it. 
My sacrificing all my worldly prospects in vindicating 
the first and execrating the last, proves the assertion. 
My intellectual eyes being partly opened, I could scru- 
tinize, analize, and realize, the mighty miseries of man, 
the fruit of error, from Siberia to Africa, and sympathise 
for the same as much as if present to my bodily eyes, 
which has often made me wish for death, to hide me 
from such bloody and bigoted cruelty. 

O prejudice, prejudice, thou enemy of man, what cause 
have I to hate thee ? How often have I tortured my- 
self, body and mind, through thy baneful influence ? I 
recollect once, for a supposed crime, i peeled the skin of 
my back, as broad as the half sheet of paper I am writing 
upon, by a superstitious invention, which none but an 
evil spirit could have suggested ; my tortures resulting 
therefrom was unutterable ; this was the punishment 
I inflicted for no crime. I have also fasted for seventy 
hours, without tasting food or drink, striving against 
imaginary crimes, while real crimes I committed with 
impunity ; for 1 had from my youth an ardent desire to 
])lease God, who I always thought took rne under his 
protection, as his adopted child, when my father and 
friends forsook me, J, therefore, depended upon him, 
and loved him ; but 1 had a wrong way of shewing itj 
owing to the poison of prejudice. Formerly I thought 
it impossible to please God, and that thought was preg- 
nant with supreme wretchedness. I now see it is the 



154 

the most exquisite delight ; though I am now, more than 
ever, bereft of friends, and beset with foes, doomed to 
perpetual exile, with no earthly prospect before me but 
tribulation and death, which, peradventure, will end my 
cares with this year. However, all the happiness I want 
here or heaven hereafter, is to please God alone ; and all 
he requires of me is to love himself above all, and to 
learn from his kindness to me, to be kind to all his crea- 
tures animal and human ; and if all men would obey this 
one simple command, this earth, from that moment, 
would be changed to a paradise ; then we would no lon- 
ger see mortals lacerating and starving themselves to 
please God,* and the same time tormenting, or at least 
injnring their fellow creatures ; nor behold them coming, 
impelled by prejudice, long journeys to be crushed to jel- 
ly, under the ponderous wheels of the car which carries 
the idol of Indostan, called Juggernott, 60 feet high. 
If error was exterminated from the earth, children would 
be instructed by mild, not coercive measures to love God 
as a most kind and merciful being, and that they must, 
as the most certain way to gain his approbation, be kind 
and merciful to every creature, human, animal, and in- 
sect. A child that was brought up in this manner, would 
love God, his parents, and preceptors affectionately, from 
youth to age, and would be so docile, humble and obe- 
dient, as to kneel at the feet of their kind parents, to enjoy 
the favour of taking a drink of wine out of a cup held in 
their hands, as I saw the African children do. This 
shews the filial subordination of their children, even at an 
advanced age ; yet these Africans, as well as the • Arabs, 
scarcely frown upon, much less flog, their children. The 
Arabs will not even whip their horses, though the most 
docile, as well as beautiful ones, on earth. 

I have avoided, as much as.possible, in these hasty re- 
marks, giving offence to any sect or any man ; my motives 
in so doing are disinterested, generous, and pure ; not sure- 
ly to preserve their frienciship, that is gone long ago, 
or gain their applause, that is impossible, while they 



* *• God is paid when man thankfully receives his gifts : to en- 
^oy is totbey." 



155 

practice and applaud errors which I invalidate; but mere- 
ly not to give premature offence, and preclude them there- 
by from receiving subsequent bent- fit. However, in or- 
der to shew the power of prejudice over common sense 
and common humanity, I will briefly relate a circum- 
stance I read in the life of a very pious preacher belong- 
ing to the most enlightened sect in Christendom, who 
come nearer to the excellent apostolic mode in their wor- 
ship than any other to my knowledge. This man, who 
was also a respectable author, relates when he first joined 
his sect, his father, who belonged to another sect perfect- 
ly opposite in principle, opposed him very much, but par- 
ticularly requested that he would at least not wt^ar his hat 
in the house, or at his meals ; this he refused to do. The 
father got, from time to time, in a most violtnt passion, 
and beat his son, though twenty years of age, most cruelly, 
which he patiendy bore, but would not obey. This ap- 
pears to me a re-action, or prejudice punished by preju- 
dice. Here was a two- fold violation of the most obvious 
laws of natural and revealed religion, viz: ^'■parents 
Jove your children^ children obey your parents i* yet rhey 
both lived to a good old age, and died in the belief that 
they were each correct in opinion and practice ; they were 
both as religious men (the young one in particular) as 
were in the neighbourhood where they lived i these men, 
no doubt, often heard the voice of the spirit of love 
whispering to them thus : " O do learn from my kind- 
ness and forbearance to you all, to be kind and bear with 
one another," and read, no doubt, from time to time, the 
language of the God of love at Pilates bar, when he was 
smote on the face and spit upon : '^ If 1 have done evil, 
bear witness against me, but if good, why smitest thou 
me ?" — as also the kind apostle St. Paul's remark, viz : 
•'If eating meat would make my brother offended, I 
MTould never eat any ;" yet alas ! with this endearing 
pattern of brotherly kindness before his eyf^s, this amia- 
ble, young man, who was brought up most genteelv, and 
received a liberal education, was so far devoid of filial 
tenderness, by the prejudice of his sect, as to cause his 
own father grievously to offend God, rather than take off 

his hat at his particuii-r request, because it war, contrary 
♦^ *u.. -.,1 .« ^f u- 4. T'u ^ , >-, 4.:..-« 



156 

no doubt, very pure, and I believe few young men now 
on earth are his equal in mental and moral excellence; but 
in the above instance he most assuredly strained at a 
knat and swallowed a camel. It will be answered he 
bore a testimony against honouring man. I have read 
it was a vice not to honour your father and mother, but 
I never rea^ it was a virtue to wear a hat in meeting or 
at meals. This is but one error among thousands : it 
is plain to me as such, but appears, no doubt, as a great 
virtue to many, the latchets of whose shoes I am not 
worthy to unloose. A thousand errors I could mention 
which I see in church and state, a hundred times worse 
than the above, particularly cruelty to children and in- 
nocent brutes. I saw a very religious man with plain 
breasted coat and broad rimmed hat, grasp his own 
child about three years old . by his thigh, and flog him 
with a strong rope, while his head was down — and all for 
a mere mistake. Such men will laugh at these remarks. 



CHAPTER V. 



CONTEMPLATIONS ON BENEVOLENCE. 

"Help me to feel another's woe, and hide the faults I see ; 
The mercy I to othe s shew, that mercy shew to me." 

In the subsequent chapters I propose briefly to suggest 
a few sentiments on some virtues unpopular in practice, 
though in profession each of them are extolled to the skies» 
In many books replete with error, elegance of diction is 
carefully attended to, but utility of matter little regarded. 
A flood of flowery words — a drop of useful matter : but 
it is vice versa here. The flowers of rhetoric are no- 
thing — the flowers of truth every thing. Yet, no doubt^ 
the most futile publications that ever disgraced the re- 
public of letters, will meet more regard than this. Yes, 



UUUUUUUUUHHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIllllHHHl 



157 



novels, romances, and jest-books, replete witli 
vulgar sensuality, I well know, will be eulogizi 
this book, which is intended and calculated to 
the felicity of the present and future generation 
treated with sovereign contempt. However, w 
hibit a glimpse of eternal truth, though few will 
less will understand. Of all the social virtues, 
more estimable and amiable than benevolence 
of our antecedent arguments are in support of tl 
What I have to say here, is merely to observi 
thing I have ever met with in my journey thr 
vale of tears, has been a greater stumbling blc 
than the want of benevolence among the pro 
the christian religion in Europe and America 
have personally v^itnessed to my astonishment ; 
I would just give one proof out of thousands, \ 
winter I w^*-ote a circular in order to stimulate al 
ritable societies in America, that most severe an( 
ing winter, (where hundreds suffered and many 
wnth hunger and cold) to contribute their quot; 
relief of the sons of misfortune, and daughters 
tion ; but particularly to stimulate one society 
delphia, with w^hich I w^as personally acquainte 
tinue their labour of love, as I well knew tl 
nodding to their fall for want of common huma 
alas ! the members of this humane institution, tl 
longing to a numerous religious sect of some 
members, suffered this amiable association, orgs 
the relief of indigent sick persons to crumble 
(the most distressing winter Philadelphia ever w 
the follo^ving tend* r and pathetic, clrculcir exp 

e 
of Philadelphia, th 



to the contrary notwithstanding, which the 
the " Democratic Press^^ 



*nn " r^r TSalti mr\r*fk '<• '^Vhi> l.rihivnh^. 



.f M 



158 - ; 

of ignorance for suffering this excellent charity with the ^ 
sick and suffering objects of their care, to be consigned i 
to oblivion with the same indifference the Levite and \ 
priest beheld the man that fell among thieves. ; 

I must acknowledge, that after the publication of the ! 
circular, about eight or ten of the members met to con- j 
suit whether they would wholly forego or re-commence '; 
their labour of love — and after some weeks consideration, : 
they recommenced visiting the miserable objects of their \ 
commisseration, but not before the winter was half over; | 
they then continued to visit a few weeks. By the time ] 
the winter was ended, they left the objects of their care '\ 
to their fate, as the Levite and priest left the wounded \ 
traveller. I said and done all I could to keep this super- ] 
excellent institution from being wrecked on the rocks of { 
inhumanity in vain. Delicacy for the feelings of the i 
members has induced me in this exordium, to withhold, j 
not only their names, but also the name of the society. — ] 
Although I will take the liberty to transcribe one of the 
articles of their constitution with the preface, that pre- 
sent and future ages may see its intrinsic utility, and that 
some benevolent person who may happen to read these 
remarks, may be stimulated to put the machinery of such 
a society once more in motion in christian cities or towns, 
where it has not been previously organized. 

Before I conclude this chapter, I must observe, 
that about six or eight of the generous members hung on 
to the last, and kept the Society in operation for seven 
years. At one time, namely, the year 1 809, it consisted 
of eighty members ; but few of the number attended to 
the duties of the institution. And is it any wonder these 
few worthy, humane, and generous individuals got dis- 
couraged when so few co-operated with them in their 
labour of love. Nay, it is rather a wonder they did not 
get discouraged sooner. Had their co-patriots acted like 
Abbe Thulle and Louverture, or the good Samaratin, 
this society would have been a blessing to thousands, in- 
stead of dozens. The preface reads thus, and Art. 6, 
sect. 1st : 

" WHEREAS, there are in the city of Philadelphia, as 
in all other populous cities, numerous sick persons, in in- 
digent circumstances, who, for the want of the guardian- 






I lUUUUUIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII 



159 

ship of some religious, or other benevolent soc 
known to suffer great bodily and spiritual distre 
as this has become matter of deep concern to ms 
feel disposed to render unto such characters p 
aid as well as spiritual advice and comfort, T 
FORE, for the better effecting these purposes, 
agreed in association to ordain and establish th( 
ing Constitution : 



ARTICLE VI. 



SECT. 1. There shall be a Visiting Commit 
shall consist of fourteen members, chosen out oj 
ciety forthwith, in such way as the Society ma 
mine, (three of whom shall be a quorum) who : 
re-elected annually at the first stated meeting 
cember. 

2. The Visiting Committee shall meet once 
at least, at such time and place as they may pi 
appoint. 

3. It shall be their duty to seek out, and r< 
their christian exhortations, advice, and prayei 
as by pecuniary support, as far as the funds of 
ciety may be Competent thereto, all such person 
come to their knowledge, who are in want of th 
of this Institution. 

4. They shall keep fair minutes of their pro( 
and lay the same before the Society^ at each 
quarterly meetings. 



160 



CIRCULAR.* 

An humble expostulation addressed to the professors of 
religion^ on the present unexampled pressure of the 
times, in Europe and Ainerica ; which is too obvious 
to every discerning- mindj to require elucidation. 
Let no man foolishly impeach GOD with the cause 
or consequences of the complicated miseries, observable, 
particularly in Europe and America, at the present pe- 
riod. He has done, and continues to do, ail he can, for 
our comfort, happiness, and salvation. This is the 
truth, let xvho will deny it ! He cannot possibly lead 
any man, Christian or pagan, to present and future hap- 
piness by any other guide, director or dictator, than his , 
own blessed and unerring Spirit ; which directed and sti- 
mulated even Socrates, though a heathen, to practice the 
most excellent virtue, and to become a martyr for the 
truth, and which he called his good genii ; — and he can- 
KOt punish as delinquents, any but such as disobey this 
divine witness of God in their consciences. 

It is impossible to express the diversified and disin- 
terested virtue this excellent monitor leads those to prac- 
tice, who obey its dictates, without any why's or where- 
fore's : But its peculiar characteristic is love, by which it 
may be distinguished from all other spirits. By various 
ways and means, this Holy Spirit points out^o every hu- 
]Tian being, v/hoseday of grace is not passed, their duty 
to God and their neighbour : namely, to love him above 
all things, and each, other as ourselves ; and to act ac- 
cordingly. He permits the wheels of commerce to stop ; 
the hopes of the agriculturalist to be prostrated; and the 
numl>er of the poor to be accumulated to try the virtue 
of the rich, as it is at this day. He, at the same time, 
uses all but forcible means, to win the rich to their own 



* I cannot help remarking here the spontaneous kindness of 
the editor of *' The Yankee,*' v/ho not only published this Circu- 
lar, but sent nne three c-pies from Boston, post paid. He done 
l.is best to aid the cau'^e of perishi'^g old a^e. And **-JI7^o does 
the best his circumstance allows^ does ii'di, acts nobly ^ an^ds 
cctild no morc.^^ 



- 161 

happiness ; I mean tlie real (not ideal) happiness of virj 
tue — ^the divine pleasure of beneficence ; for, 

*• Who aids the cause of innocence distrest, 
Is by the act alone supremely blest.'* 
•' No greater pleasure man on earth can kaow^, 
Than that of feeling and relieving woe !'* 

Yes, it is one of the fundamental laws of nature, that 
no man shall ever find happiness in promoting the mise- 
ry of man, or in refusing to alleviate the same, when in 
his power so to do ; and, on the other hand, no man can 
miss of finding the true road to happiness, who sincerely 
endeavours to promote the happintss of his fellow crea- 
tures, and glory of his Creator. 

And he uses poverty as a means to compel fif I may 
be allowed the expression) the poor to seek refuge in his 
own bosom. These lines are therefore intended to sti 
mulate the rich to pity and alleviate the distresses of the 
poor, which may be conceived, but cannot be expressed, 
these distressing times ; or, if they will not, they will at 
least forever take from them the excuse of ignorance at a 
future period, which will very soon arrive ! For, most 
assuredly, the good Spirit (who, even while they are 
reading these disinterested lines, is whispering in their 
intellectual ears, " O! DO ! ! learn from my pity and 

KINDNESS TO YOU ALL, TO PITY AND BE KIND TO YOUR 

SUFFERING FELLOW MORTALS !") will soon and shortly 
be their accuser at the Judgment seat of Christ, if they 
will not obey his mild and merciful dictates. 

To the members of charitable institutions in Europe 
and America, I would say : ** This is your harvest, the 
time to lay up much treasure in heaven, to enjoy the ap- 
proving smile of God, the blessings of his poor children, 
and the approbation of your own consciences ; and above 
all, to confound and confute whole corps of philosophical 
unbelievers : for, if you act wiiTi mercy to your unhappy 
fellow-travellers to the silent grave, they will see your 
good works, and be constrained to glorify your Father 
-which is in heaven. But, on the contrary, should the 
conduct of our religious, as well as charitable Societies, 
be a perfect contrast to the above labour of love, they 
will cause the poor to cry to heaven for redress ; phi! a 

c2 



^ 162^ 

sophical unbelievers to stumble through unbelief; and, 
eventually, without repentance, force the reluctant ven- 
geance of heaven upon themselves, like a blast of mildew 
on the tender herbage ! Woe be to them who circumvent 
the mouth of labour ; who, by force, fraud, or speculation, 
or low cunning, enrich themselves at the expense of ho- 
nest industry till they are cloyed with super- abundance ; 
and then rush into all manner of extravagant sensuality, 
even till they cannot enjoy it ; while old age is perish- 
ing, and infancy starving, for their portion of the neces- 
saries of life ; which God provides plentifully for the 
support and comfort of all his creatures. Yes, the 
TRUTH IS, he constantly provides for his poor, what 
the rich, as constantly, or at least too often, supplant 
them of ; and then, intellectually behold them perish 
without pity, while the offalls of their kitchens, and the 
trimmings of their wardrobes, would effectually allay the 
hunger of the disconsolate widow and the weeping or- 
phan ; and array the perishing limbs of the poor old 
iTian, propped on his staff, and shaking as he goes. Can 
the source and sum-total of benevolence behold this 
shocking contrast, this super-inhuman delinquency, with- 
out indignation ? It is impossible! The-n may He who 
is the source of benevolence, incline the hearts of those 
who profess to be his followers, to establish Benevolent 
Societies for the relief of the poor, in the cities where 
they have not been established. And, above all, may he 
stimulate by his grace, those professors of religion who 
have already organized such Societies, not to look back, 
or get weary of well-doing ; and, above all, at their pe- 
ril not to abrogate them, and thereby confirm unbelievers 
in their prejudices against Christ and his benevolent re- 
ligion ; which they unquestionably will do, if they should 
thus demonstrate by their actions, that they have no 
bowels of compassion, or even humanity, for their mise- 
rable fellow- creatures : especially if they verbally pro- 
fess much love for their Creator, and have the word Re- 
ligion always playing upon their lips ! 

Mav the antecedent and present members of *' The 
* # # # # Society," and " The Benevolent Society in- 
stituted in Trenton, for the relief and instruction of the 
sick poor, A. D. 1807;" O may they in particular, be 



163 '' ^ 

siirred up and stimulated to redouble their diligence in 
seeking out and alleviating the miseries of their suffering 
fellow-creatures ; like our blessed Saviour, may tliey i^o 
about doing- good ^ by all possible means : especially at the 
present calamitous period, seeing the day is fast approach- 
ing, when they will, most assuredly, have to give a strict 
account of their conduct relative to the above excellent 
charities ; wherefore, if they have abrogated them, may 
they forthwith re-organize them, and re-commence their 
labour of love ! Let no man say, " but who is the writer 
of these expostulations ?" but rather let every reader asV 
the Spirit of Christ within, (which they must feel unless 
they be reprobates,) whether these remarks are true or 
false. If true, forthwith obey them ; if false, pity the 
man who has taken so much trouble, and, from the most 
generous and disinterested motives, in vain. 



rilAPTER VI. 



:ONTEMPLATIONS ON THE SCRIPTURES. 

'Tis here the folly of the rich, 
Through all their schemes we view ; 
And while their tongues the charge deny, 
The Scriptures own it true. 

If all the books in the world were put together, they 
would n9t be so worthy of the investigation and contem- 
plation of the learned and illiterate, the rich and the 
poor, as the books of the Holy Scriptures. Like their 
divine author, they are at once simple and sublime, an- 
cient and new. In the blessed Bible is contained every 
information necessary to pj^omote the present and future 
happiness of mankind, though, alas ! too often perverted 
to his destruction. What book in the world inculcates 
more mild and merciful truths than the Gospel ? Yet 



164 

has It been the innocent cause of many bloody wars ! 
Alas ! how often has bigoted priests, with this blessed 
book in their polluted hands, and tyrannical potentates, 
with the sign of the cross waving over their guilty heads, 
been seen marching to slaughter and destroy their com- 
paratively innocent fellow mortals. But surely the scrip- 
tures should not be invalidated, because such hypocrites 
wrested them to their own, as well as their fellow crea- 
tures destruction. Where do we find history so ancient, 
theology so consistent, poetry so beautiful, natural philo- 
sophy so sublime, morality so pure, prophecy so true, or 
religion ^o divine, as that which is contained in that 
much abused, and grievously perverted book, called the 
Holy Bible ? What can command more admiration and 
commendation than the patience of Job, the divine love 
of Abraham, the parental tenderness of Jacob, the jus- 
tice and chastity of Joseph, the friendship pf Jonathan, 
the sorrows of David, the lamentations of Jeremiah ? but 
above all the infinite love and cruel death of our adorable 
Redeemer, who died that we might live, and lives that 
we may never die ? O who can view the blesscdjbleed- 
ing Son of God, all beautiful in distress, and melodious 
in his woe, without shedding a penitential tear ; " For- 
give them Father'''^ cries he, with his dying.voice, sweeter 
than the songs of angels, '•'■forgive my murderers^ for 
they know not what they do ?" O what infinite love, im- 
maculate virtue, and mercy so divine, 

** Ve who have passions for a tender tear. 
Give nature vent, and come and drop it here.** 



165 



CHAPTER VII. 



CONTEMPLATIONS ON REPENTANCE. 

To prayer, repentance, and obedience due, 
(Tho' but endeavoured with sincere intent) 
Mine ear shall not be slow ; niine eye not shut ; 
Light after light, well used they shall attain ; 
But they who scorn this light, shull never taste 
My grace divine ; but blind be blinded more. 
Such tliankless rebels ne'er shall find my rest. 

[^MiltoTiy nvith variations. 

I will be bold to affirm, that there is no man who 
knows himself, but sees the necessity of practising this 
virtue every day ; as the best man stands every moment 
in need of the merits of Christ's death, so h€ stands in 
need of humility and penitence every moment. True 
repentance is always followed by reformation j God is so 
very pure, and the best of men are comparatively so ve- 
ry impure, that the man who sees even a glimpse of the 
contrast, will feel it his duty to pray for pardon till the 
hour of his death. But to no purpose does any man pray 
for pardon, unless he also pardons from his heart, those 
who have offended him ; or professes religion, unless he 
truly loves his enemy. He who lives one hour, without lift- 
ing a grateful thought to heaven, as well as he who unne- 
cessarily kills an innocent insect, are both guilty of sins, and 
both need repentance. But this much talked of and little 
practised virtue, like all others, has its counterfeit. He 
who repents for f^ar of hell, and not out of pure love to a 
kind but offended God, is as far from feeling this virtue, 
as they that love religion fpr the sake of recompense, 
and who follow Christ for the loaves and fishes. The 
fact is, without humility and love, there can be no true 
repentance. Restitution, as well as reformation, is among 
the first fruits of repentance ; the writer, or preacher, 
who do not practice what they teach, are certafinly hypo- 
criits. I do not make a pompous profession of religion 



1G6 

•r virtue ; however, I certainly may practice the virtue 
under consideration in this place. As I feel a social love 
to all men, and a sincere sorrow for ever injuring any 
man, I am disposed at this time, to make all the resti- 
tution in my power to those I have injured in my publi- 
cations, or at least have done by them, as I would not 
wish they should do by me, in similar circumstances. 
Of all my works, eighteen exclusive of this one, I only 
lament being the author of one, which I hereby declare 
to be an abortion ; I wrote it when I was a blind secta- 
rian, and in favour of one sect and against another. 
There was too much cause, I must confe&s, for many of 
the animadversions it contained j but being under the 
influence of passions and prejudices, peculiar to all sects, 
I must say I declared even the truth with too much bit- 
terness ; I did not see my error then, but now I clearly 
see my fault, and am not afraid nor ashamed to retract. 
The minister and the congregation I wrote against, were 
at least, I firmly believe, as good as the minister and con- 
gregation in whose favour I wrote, and from whom I af- 
terwards separated myself honourably, though many of 
them have since had the meanness, among other calum- 
nies, to declare, in their private circles, that I was excom- 
municated, than which, a greater falsehood could not be 
propagated. I need not mention the names of these con- 
tending ministers or their congregations, but merely the 
name of my book, viz. — " The Curse of Christendom ;'* 
and the one I wrote against, namely, " Christian Bap- 
tism," the author of which, my opponent, I found after- 
wards to be a man of talents and a gentleman, and I am 
truly sorry I ever took up my pen against him. Though 
this acknowledgement is disinterested, gefterous, and 
pure, because I do not expect either affection or favour 
from any of them, yet no doubt it will be counted the 
quintessence of meanness, by the sons of pride ; however,^ 
I care not what they think or say of me, so long as I do 
them no manner of .harm, nor wilfully offend tliem, nor 
cause them to offend God. I do not pretend to say my 
other works are without fault, they have no doubt many- 
imperfections. 

" For he who looks a perfect book to see. 
Looks for yvh'cit was not, and will never be;" 



167 

Notwithstanding, they are principally intended and 
calculated to instruct, and be a permanent benefit to man- 
kind. Yet. if my works in general should ever be re-pub- 
lished, I do hope " the Curse of Christendom" will be 
left out of the collection. I must also mention another 
error I committed in one of my books, called the " Beau- 
ties of Philanthropy," viz : I had a controversy with a 
respectable and intelligent minister, about twelve years 
ngo, to whom I addressed some virulent animadversions 
in that work, and to which I subjoined the initials of his 
name ; although I did not see then, I now clearly see 
this conduct was a breach of the golden rule. For a 
long time I have seen the ingenerosity of publicly ex- 
posing the above minister, however reprehensible he 
might have been ; and have published, since that time, 
fifty thousand books, moral, political, and philosophical, 
but never had resolution, till now, to make an acknow- 
ledgement of my error, commensurate with its publicity. 
People may talk, and profess the virtue of repentance, 
but if they have injured their neighbours, whatever was 
their motive for so doing, and refuse to make commensu- 
rate atonement therefor, to the utmost of their power, 
however mortifying it may be to their pride, their repen- 
tance is surely counterfeit. 

What did John the Baptist mean, when he command- 
ed his hearers in the name of the Lord, to bring forth 
fruit, meet for repentance ? Most assuredly restitution, as 
far as possible. If I love my neighbour as myself, can 
I backbite him ? Impossible. Can I worship God accep- 
tably, and hate my brother ? Impossible. Can I truly 
repent before a heart' searching God, and not make res- 
titution for injury done my fellow traveller to the grave, 
in the same ratio as it was done, whether public or pri- 
vate ? Impossible. As I conceive it unnecessary to 
transcribe the aforesaid controversy in this place, I will 
only mention the page in which, the initials of this gen- 
tleman's name is, and hope if any one should re-publish 
this book hereafter, they would leave said initials out al- 
together ; they are in 47th, 83d, and 84th pages of the 
"Beauties of Philanthropy;" and I would wish the follow- 
ing paragraph to be left out also, (see pages 45, 46, 4r,) 
for however reprehensible people may be, collectively or 



168 

individually, such acrimonious language is totally unjus- 
tifiable. It reads thus : 

** We will suppose, for the sake of illustration, that the 
enemies of the subsequent charity, (though it se<ems a 
contradiction in terms and ideas, that a professor of the 
Christian religion would be an enemy to it) succeeded in 
their irreligious endeavours to abolish the Benevolent 
Society. I would ask, would not the develish professors 
of godliness who accomplished this diabolical object, be 
literally instrumental in the hands of satan, of snatching 
the words of comfort, as well as the pecuniary relief which 
would have been administered, through the instrumen- 
tality of this society, from the sons and daughters of af- 
fliction ? Certainly they would; and not only so, but 
they would be the means of precluding the members of 
said society from receiving the most essential benefit, re- 
sulting from their visiting the sick and the afflicted ; for 
they preach louder than words. A sick bed will preach a 
more useful and salutary sermon, than a thousand divines 
put together. In addition to the above evils, resulting from 
such barbarous inhumanity, in hypocritical professions of 
the love of God and men, there is still a greater evil to 
be mentioned, and that is the expiring delinquent who 
might have received divine consolation (had the society 
continued) in his dying moments, he will rise up in the 
last day, and accuse the annihilators of the Hospitable 
Society, and say, ye cruel, unfeeling, barbarous, and hy- 
pocritical Pharisees, had it not been for your envy, acri- 
mony, and inhumanity, I would have received comfort 
and consolation, in my expiring moments, by means of 
the visitors of the Hospitable Society, and perhaps might 
have been (with many others as guilty as myself) par- 
doned even at the eleventh hour. Hence, ye deluded 
devotees, ye are the virtual cause of my eternal condem- 
nation. The persons who were the primary cause of the 
abolition of the Hospitable Society, are guilty of these 
enormous, I may say, infamous evils ; and whether they 
believe it or not, will have to answer for the same at the 
bar of God." 

There are few even of the children of light and love, 
but what feel and find, to their unutterable grief, many 
faults to repent of, because the light in which they live 



I lUUIIIIIIIIIII Illllllllllllllllllllllll 



169 



makes manifest their daily imperfections ; \\ 
proud Pharisee, in particular, -and the chil 
darkness in general consider themselves faultless 
full of error. Wherefore, without the light of 
Spirit, there can be no true repentance. O ! if c 
less Pharisees, who profess and preach sanctific 
riodically in their congregations, as I used to 
themselves as they are seen, their hearts would i 
melt \Tith tender anguish at the remembrance 
manifold offences, as mine does this very mo 
will mention one more literary fault, the rememl 
v/hich is grievous to me to the present period, 
considered it a virtue when I was a sanctimonio 
ber ef the clerical community. It is this. Wl 
ing, several years ago, a chapter in the '' Beauti^ 
lanthropy," against Deism, I, like too many sc 
and ecclesiastic defenders of ChristianUy, had tl 
ness and cruelty to attack the private character ( 
fortunate, but intelligent philosophical unbelief 
considered myself, withal, a champion in the 
Christ. Alas ! what will not darkness do, or rat 
will not man do, when the light that is in him is 
clarknrss. Fox's Martyrology will tell. I will 
to affirm that the sectarian spirit, which dictated 
sequent accusation against a poor unfortunate ma 
least in miniature what the spirits of the inqui 
Spain is in magnitude. They may think they 8 
as I did, but I know they are, and I was radical! 
while composing the following lines in the ''Be 
Philanthropy," page 150. 

*' But the question recurs : in what manner dc 
taries of infidelty show their kindness to each otl 
facts speak : One of their most popular champic 
seau, by his conduct will testify, which will suf 



170 

/ 

/ 

lower order of beings. He even bestowed the most ful- 
some panegyric on a prostitute, whom he and many others, 
according to his own acknowledgement, had, in their 
turns, criminal connection with. His conduct was such 
as to excite the disgust and execration of even a Stoic 
philosopher." 

I look upon this quotation with indignation and con- 
tempt, and pity and despise myself for being the author 
of the bigoted, super- inhuman, dastardly paragraph, 
wrote against a po jr unfortunate man, a man of genius, 
who never injured me. The time I wrote, or rather re- 
tailed ^the above popular scandal, (such stuff I call no 
better name, though read with delightful approbation by 
millions of Christian professors) I am bold to affirm, I 
was not v/orthy to be a candlestick for this elegant but 
unfortunate author. (Q^ A poor bigoted booby. Little 
did I think then, and little do such intolerant sectarians, 
in all denominations, think nov/, with what sovereign 
contempt and detestation God beholds the man or men 
who violate his fundamental law, viz : " Love one ano* 
ther^'^ under pretence of vindicating his cause. If poor 
J. J. Rosseau did send his children to the poor house, it 
was, no doubt, because he was too poor to support them 
at home. But he was a deist. And who made him one ? 
who planted in his breast such invincible prejudice against 
^ the Christian religion ? Most assuredly the cruel and hy- 
pocritical conduct of millions of its most sanguine vota- 
ries. And the same cause would have produced the 
same effects in myself long ago ; but 

** I felt and feel the bliss his wounds impart, 
I find Christ^ loving Spirit m my heart." 

What makes me more regret the above paragraph in 
the *^ Beauties of Philanthropy," is the perusal of the fol- 
lowing generous eulogium on the character of our gracious 
Redeemer, written by this deistical philosopher. It reads 
thus : 

^ I will confess to you,' says he, ' that the maje3ty of the 
scriptures strikes me with admiration, as the purity of 
the gospel hath its influence on my heart. Peruse the 
w^orks of our philosophers with all their pomp of diction : 
how mean, how contemptible are they, compared with 
the scripture ! Is it possible that a book, at once so sim- 



iijmiimymiiimpgyp,mimiyum,ui, 



171 



pie and sublime, should be merely the v/qrk of r 
it possible that the sacred personage, v/hose histor 
tains, should be himself a mere man ? Do we 1 
he assumes the tone of an enthusiast or ambitioi 
ry ! What sweetness, what purity in his manner 
an affecting gracefulness in his delivery ! What s 
in his maxims ! What profound wisdom in his 
ses ! What presence of mind, what subtlety, wl 
in his replies ! How great the command over 
sions ! Where is the man, where the philosopi 
could so live, and so die, without weakness and 
ostentation ? When Plato described his imagin; 
man, loaded with all the shan\e of guilt, yet mei 
highest rewards of virtue, he describes exactly 
racter of Jesus Christ; the resemblance was so 
that all the Fathers perceived it. What prepo 
what blindness must it be, to compare the son of 
niscus to the Son of Mary ! What an infinite di 
tion there is between them ? Socrates dying witl 
or ignomy, easily supported his character to the 
his death, however easy, had not crowned hi 
might have been doubted whether Socrates, witl 
wisdom, was any thing more than a vain sophist, 
vented, it is said, the theory of morals. Other 
ver, had before put them in practice ; he had 
say, therefore, what they had done, and to redi 
examples to precepts. Aristides had been jus 
Socrates defined justice ; Leonidas had given u{ 
for his country before Socrates declared patriot! 
a duty ; the Spartans were a sober people before 
recommended sobriety ; before he had even def 
tue, Greece abounded in virtuous men. Bi 
could Jesus learn, among his competitors, that ] 



ieared. Socrates, in receiving the poison, blessed in- 
deed the weeping executioner vvha administered it : but 
Jesus, in the midst of excrutiating tortures, prayed for his 
merciless tormentors. Yes, if the life and death of So- 
crates were those of a sage, the life and death of Jesus 
are those of a God. Shall v/e suppose the evangelic 
history a mere fiction ? Indeed, my friend, it bears not 
the marks of fiction ; on the contrary, the history of So- 
crates, which nobody presumes to doubt^ is not so well 
attested as that of Jesus Christ. Such a supposition,, in 
fact, only shifts the difficulty, without obviating it : it is 
more inconceivable that a number of persons should 
agree to write such a history, than that only one should 
furnish the history of it. The Jewish authors were in- 
capable of the diction, and strangers to the morality con- 
tained in the gospel, the marks|of whose truth are so strik- 
ing and inimitable, that the inventor would be a more 
astonishing character than a hero." 

Before I conclude this chapter, I must lament that the 
amiable and elegant author of tTiat admirable perform- 
ance " A Plea for the Christian reltgwn^'^ should be 
among the clerical persecutors of this unfortunate author^ , 
I question if there was a better or a brighter minister in 
Europe than David Simpson. I thought and think so 
highly of him, that I published the following brief enco- 
mium on him in my " Rights of God,'' page 151, 152. 

" I have said so much on this subject in my other 
v/orks, particularly my ' Paradise Displayed,' and 
' Beauties of Philanthropy,' and have got such a host of 
enemies for the same, that I will content myself at pre- 
sent, in transcribing the words of a noble man by nature, 
who deserves a statue of gold, for boldly exposing the 
corruption of hierarchy, and the hypocrisy and duplicity 
of its votaries ; which he has done to perfection, be- 
cause he wrote from experience." 

This will demonstrate that my motives are pure and 
unprejudiced in these remarks, which is to shew what 
the powerful poison of prejudice will do even in the best 
of men. The following quotation from ''Simpson's 
Plea," page 44, will prove the fact : and now he is dead 
he knows whether the animadversions therein were true,"^ 
and even if true^ if they were wrote in a phraseology which 



l|IVlllllll>¥l|H«IPIlHMmiUliyuUMUU 



173 



was an echo from the golden rule. However, 
declare it my firm belief, that Rosseau never i 
the acknowledgments which this author has im 
him ; nor, indeed, no man of sense, and in hi 
could. The quotation reads thus : 

" Rosseau was born at Geneva ; and, at a pre 
was bound apprentice to an artist. During his 
ticeship he frequently robbed his master as well 
persons. Before his time was expired he decam 
into the dominions of the king of Sardinia, m 
professed to be a Catholic. By an unexpecrec 
fortune he became a footman ; in which capacity 
got not his old habit of stealing. He was detect 
the stolen goods ; swore that they were given h 
maid servant of the house ; the girl was confron 
him ; she denied the fact, and, weeping, pressei 
confess the truth ; but, the young philosopher i 
sisted in the lie, and the poor girl was driven fi 
place in disgrace. 

"Tired of being a servant man, he went to thi 
self on the protection of a lady, whom he had s< 
before, and who, he protests, was the mo;t 
creature of her sex. The liKiy had so great a re 
him, that she called him her little darling, and 1 
her mamma. Mamma had a footman, who se' 
besides, in another capacity, very much resemb 
of a husband ; but she had a most tender aife 
her adopted son Rosseau ; and, as she feared 
* forming connections with a certain lady whi( 
spoil his murals, she herself, out of pure virt 
bini — to bed with her ! — -This virtuous elfort to 
the purity of Rosseau's heart, had a dreadful eff 
the poor footman, for he poisoned himself. Ros 

cir-V arirl tvi n rr* rvk -li xxrac nKlifvr-Tl fr>. rtmrt w.Mtl-* lif-rl^ 



• 17^ 

ieared. Socrates, in receiving the poison, blessed in- 
deed the weeping executioner who^ administered it : but 
Jesus, in the midst of excrutiating tortures, prayed for his 
merciless tormentors. Yes, if the life and death of So- 
crates were those of a sage, the life and death of Jesus 
are those of a God. Shall we suppose tlie evangelic 
history a mere fiction ? Indeed, my friend, it bears not 
the marks of fiction ; on the contrary, the history of So- 
crates, which nobody presumes to doubt, is not so well 
attested as that of Jesus Christ. Such a supposition,, in 
fact, only shifts the difficulty, without obviating it : it is 
more inconceivable that a number of persons should 
agree to write such a history, than that only one should 
furnish the history of it. The Jewish authors were in- 
capable of the diction, and strangers to the morality con- 
tained in the gospel, the marks|of whose truth are so strik- 
ing and inimitable, that the inventor would be a more 
astonishing character than a hero." 

Before I conclude this chapter, I must lament that the 
amiable and elegant author of that admirable perform- 
ance " A Plea for the Christian religioii^^'* should be 
among the clerical persecutors of this unfortunate author. 
I question if there was a better or a brighter minister in 
Europe than David Simpson. I thought and think so 
highly of him, that I published the following brief enco- 
mium on him m my " Rights of God," page 151, 152. 

" I have said so much on this subject in my other 
Vvorks, particularly my * Raradise Displayed,' and 
' Beauties of Philanthropy,' and have got such a host of 
enemies for the same, that I will content myself at pre- 
sent, in transcribing the words of a noble man by nature, 
who deserves a statue of gold, for boldly exposing the 
corruption of hierarchy, and the hypocrisy and duplicity 
of its votaries ; which he has done to perfection, be- 
cause he wrote from experience." 

This will demonstrate that my motives are pure and 
unprejudiced in these remarks, v;hich is to shew what 
the powerful poison of prejudice will do even in the best 
of men. The following quotation from "Simpson's 
Plea," page 44, will prove the fact : and now he is dead 
he knows whether the animadversions therein were true,'^ 
and even if true, if they were wrote in a phraseology which 



173 

vfas an echo from the golden rule. However, I must 
declare it my firm belief, that Kosseau ntvtr made all 
the acknowledgments which this author has imputed to 
him ; nor, indeed, no man of sense, and in his senscB, 
could. The quotation reads thus : 

" Rosseau was born at Geneva ; and, at a proper age, 
was bound apprentice to an artist. During liis appren- 
ticeship he frequently robbed his master as well as other 
persons. Before his time was expired he decamped, fled 
into the dominions of the king of Sardinia, where he 
professed to be a Catholic. By an unexpected turn of 
fortune he became a footman ; in which capacity he for- 
got not his old habit of stealuig. He was detected with 
the stolen goods ; swore that they were given him by a 
maid servant of the house; the girl was confronted with 
him ; she denied the fact, and, weeping, pressed him to 
confess the truth ; but, the young philosopher still per- 
sisted in the lie, and the poor girl was driven from her 
place in disgrace. 

"Tired of being a servant man, he went to throw him- 
self on the protection of a lady, whom he had seen once 
before, and who, he protests, was the mri^t virtuous 
creature of her sex. The liidy had so great a regard for 
him, that she called him her little darling, and he called 
her mamma. Mamma had a footman, who served her 
besides, in another capacity, very much resembling that 
of a husband ; but she had a most tender aflection for 
her adopted son Rosseau; and, as she feared he was' 
forming connections with a certain lady which miglit 
spoil his morals, she herself, out of pure virtue, tot.k 
him — to bed with her ! — This virtuous effort to preserve 
the purity of Rosseau's heart, had a dreadful effect upon 
the poor footman, for he poisoned himseh. Rosseau fell 
sick, and mamma was obliged to- part with little darling, 
while he performed a jc^iyney to the south of France, for 
the recovery of his heafth. On the roarl he dined with 
a gentleman, and debauched his wife, fie was return- 
ing back, he debated with himself whether he shouh! p:iy 
his lady a second visit or not ; but fearing he might be 
tempted to seduce her daughter also, virtue got the bet- 
ter, and determined thv little darling to fly liome into the 
arms of mamma : but, ulas ! those arms were filled w'lih 

p 2 



176 

cinity of this majestic* Steeplehouse, which cost millions 
of money, old age is perishing and infancy starving tor 
want of the ofFalls of their kitchens and the trimmings 
of their wardrobes. On the other hand, how pleasing 
must the sight be to God, and honorable to man, w hich 
th^ primitive church exhibited in the act of adoration. 
When we recollect the consistency of their mode of wor- 



* "The calhed.al church of St Peter's at Ronoe, i>> *es eemed a 
master- piece of modern architecture, and s:iikcs the spectator 
with admiration and ast(.>nishment. The circular area which 
lies before this magnificent edifice is encompasstd by a beautiful 
peristyle or c* lon.ide, c<'nsisting of two huj'died aiul eighty-four 
marble pillars of the D ric order, which support an architrave 

adorned with a vast number ot statues of saints and martyrs 

The rbelisk already mentioned, and a fine fountain on each side 
of it, are great additions to the beauty of this spacious court, from 
whence there is a flight of steps to a grand terrace that leads 
into the lofty portico before the church. Over this portico, 
which is supported by pillars eighteen feet in circumference, are 
the statues of our Saviour, and the twelve apostles ; and there is 
ako a fine balcony, where tht P.pcs are crowned in view of all 
the people. Tlie body of tht church, as well as the cupola, 
which is adorned with curious mosaic work, is sustained by large 
square pillars, like th^^se of St. Paul's cathedral in L ndon ; and 
under the middle of the cupola stands the high altar, which is 
ninety feet in height, being a kind of pavilion, supported by four 
wreathed columns of brass, ad ^rned with foliagt: ; and on the top 
of the canopy are four angels of gilt brass, holding festoons of 
flowers most beautifully carved ; and between them are figures 
of children playing on the cornice. The ascent to the dome is by 
a winding stair-case, and fr(nn ther-ce to the ball by an incommo- 
dious flight of stairs, which lies between the outer and inner 
dome. The height trom the pavenu nt to the top of the cross is 
four hundred ar.d thirty-two feet, and the diameter of the ball is 
eight feet four inches. St. Peter*s chair is made of gilded bravs, 
and supported by four gigantic figures, i^presentLig four fathers 
of the church, with a glory over ihem extending q\x\X.t to the roof. 
Under this chair is an altar, and on each side are stately monu- 
ments of brass and marble, of exsellent workmanship. It is 
scarcely possible to describe the riches and beauty of the little 
chapels and altars round this church,; yet the giidhig, carving,, 
paintings, embossed work, brass and marbl-'. statues, &c. are so 
•well contrived and disposed, that the abundance occasions not 
the least confusion, nor does any thing seem superfluous. But 
among all the ornaments of this cathfcdi*al, none deserve our at- 
tention more than the mosaic pictures which represent several 
pieces of scriptural and ecclesiastical history, and exceed any 
thing of that kind that ever was done by the ancients." 



177 

3hip and the reciprocal love of the worshippers, the amia- 
ble simplicity of their manners, equality of their domes- 
tic economy, the ample provision made for their poor, 
and the equilibrium they maintained as it respected pow- 
er and riches, (indeed they had all things in common,) 
we are struck with admiration. The money, that is 
squandered now in ornamenting places for worship, and 
supporting ministers in elegant idleness, was then given 
for the support of widows and orphans. Witness the 
Lord Bishop of Waterford, who receives about 80,000 
dollars a year for reading a few sermons. Yet he can 
see in the vicinity of his splendid domain the poor perish 
for want, without common commisseration. Indeed, it 
is impossible for language to express the astonishing con- 
trast between primitive and present Christianity, in prin- 
ciple and practice. When I read the excellent apostolic 
mode of social worship, and contrast it with our modern 
modes, I am truly amazed that all the people themselves 
do not see the extravagant absurdity and iniquity* of the 
one, and the economical excellence and utility of the other. 
It is a matter of amazement to me that every body who 
reads the following description of the true mode of worship 
by St. Paul, and then peeps into our superb churches, do 
not at once see the melancholy dissimilarity, and no lon- 
ger support this moral corruption,! ecclesiastical* mono- 
poly, and systematical usurpation. Jf they do not see it, 
surely great must be their darkness, as the following 
chapters clearly shew, not only the true mode of christian 
worship, but also the only true spirit with which we can 
worship a heart-searching God : 

" Though I speak with the tongues of men and of an- 
gels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding 
brass, or a tinkling cymbal; and though I have the gift 
of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all 



* " Whatever mitigates the woes, or incrtases the happiness of 
others, this is my criterion of goodness : and whatever injures 
society at large, or any individual in it — thfe is niy measureof ini- 
quiiy. What think rou, madam of my creed ?'* Says the In- 
genious but unfortunate Scottish baid, Robert Kurns. 

t Sons of Columbia hear the truth in time, 
He who suppoi'ts corruption, shares the crime. 



17S 

knowledge ; and though I have all faith, so that I could 
remove mountains, and have no charity, I am nothing. 
And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and 
though I give my body to be burned, and have not cha- 
rity, it profiteth me nothing. Charity suffereth long, and 
is kind ; charity envieth not ; charity vaunteth not itself, 
is not puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, seekelh 
not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil, re- 
joiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth ; beareth 
all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth 
all things. Charity never faileth : but whether there be 
prophecies, they shall fail ; whether there be tongues, they 
shall cease ; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish 
away. For we know in part, and we prophecy in part. 
But when that which is perfect is come, then that which 
is in part shall be done away. When I was a child, I 
spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a 
child : but when I became a man, I put away childish 
things. For now we see through a glass, darkly ; but 
then face to face : now I know in part ; but then shall I 
know even as also I am known. And now abideth faith, 
hope, charity, these three ; but the greatest of these is 
charity."* 



CHAPTER IX. 

CONTEMPLATIONS ON PATRIOTISM. 

The wretch who sells his country to a knave, 
He is at once a tyrant and a slave ; 
And they who royal majesty adore, 
Are basely guilty, and are justly poor. 

I scarcely know which to wonder at most, the stupid 
blindness and base servility of the people in monarchial 
countries, or the super- inhuman villainy and guilty pre- 

* For chapter 14th, see page 191. 



179 •' 

tensions of their royal tyrants. It is most assuredly the 
will of God that his creatures should be happy, tree, and 
independent ; and they would be so were it not tor their 
own pervcrseness and black ingratitude. When a nation 
treats God with so much contempt as to chuse a base 
murderer for their sovereign, in preference to the sove- 
reign of the skies, is it any wonder he gives them up to 
strong delusions, that they should believe the most abomi- 
nable and foolish lie, namely, the divine rights of legitima- 
cy? And is it not a just re-action of a righteous Providence 
when such scophants and slaves are grievously oppressed 
by the kings they worship, instead oi God. But when a 
population is cured by calamity of their base servility, 
and wish to withdraw their necks from the cruel and de- 
grading iron yoke, it is most lamentable to see such an 
enlightened people struggling for liberty in vain. Such 
is the miserable population of Ireland. Tht people of 
England are also beginning to see the extravagant absur- 
dity, and burlesque on their own country of importing a 
royal family from Hanover to oppress them, at the expense 
of billions of money and national character ; the deed is a 
direct insinuation that Britons are all fools. They are 
brought by such folly to the brink of national ruin. It is 
amazing that the people did not see long ago the absur- 
dity and servility of worshipping their kings and priests. 
Oh ! what mountains of human misery there is, and have 
been in the world, the fatal fruit of political darkness and 
delusion. Filty volumes would not contain the gloomy 
dreadful description. Famine, oppression, and starva- 
tion is now the portion of millions of mankind, the natu- 
ral offspring of monarchy ; and yet these miserable mil- 
lions are not yet cured of their predeliction for this ex- 
pensive absurdity, while the American government is a 
living monument to demonstrate its futility and fatality. 
Here the whole officers of government can be supported 
for a whole year, from the president to the lowest con- 
stable, for what a useless royal family will expend of the 
national income in one night of luxurious festivity, and 
for one suit of a queens wedding apparel, richly studded 
with jewels; while thousands of females, far her supe- 
rior, are suffering for want of the necessaries of life. 



The people of England are petitioning their parlia^ 
ment for its reformation, but little do they consider the 
impossibility of a vitiated body, correcting itself; were 
they to put their shoulders to the wheel, like the wagon- 
ner in the fable, and call upon God to help them, and feit 
disposed to take him for their only legitimate monarch, 
then indeed they would soon find a perfect delivarence 
from their Lilliputian bonds, -and their degrading yoke. 
Very many Irish arrived in New- York last summer, 
while I was there ; I saw them in melancholy groups 
walking the streets ; cruel oppression drove them to a 
foreign shore ,* they spent their little all to pay their pas- 
sage and incidental expenses, and when arrived here 
they found business dull. But oppression not only drove 
them from their own shores, but followed these their 
victims, to this shore of liberty, and pressed some of 
them OR board the floating dungeons before they had 
time to land. This reminds me of a pathetic discourse, 
which took place between a compassionate man in New- 
York, and a poor girl recently arrived from that land of 
oppression, that house of bondage. It reads thus : 



Cjt'izen, 
IRISH maiden, whither fly you ? 

Whence the mcisture on your cheek ? 
Danger here shall not come nigh y . u — 

Tell me what and whom you seek. 

Irish Girl. 
Pity, sir, a hapless stranger, 

Friendless on a f reign, shore; 
Much, alas! I fear of danger — 

I'm from Erin just come o'er. 

CltlZEN. 

Where's your kindred, friends, protector? 

Sure you ventured not alone ? 
Had you not some kind director ? 

Mother, sister — have you none ? 

Irish Girl, 
Yes, I have — I had a brother. 

Once a widnwed parents stay ; 
Yes, aias! I hud 3. mother — 

Both bv fate were snatch'd awavl 



IB I 

Cl'YlZEN. 

I'lien, an orphan, uiipiotected, 
Vou have left your nruive 1 le, 

To Columbia's shore directed, 
Where you meet no kindred's smile ^ 

Irish Gjrl. . 

No— a parent, and a brother, 
With me fiom oppi*ession run. 

Death deprivc-d me of my mother- 
Cruel hviioii's preas^d Iier son I 

"Under freedom's banner sailing-. 
Just ill view of freedom's shore, 

Lrighteniiii; prospects Mope was hailing; 
VVhispenng futui e blibs in store .' 

When wc spied the f?;ig of Britain, 
Where foreboding tancy read» 

Some impending evil written — 
How my bosom beat with dread ; 

First a shot our course arrested. 

Then their slavea disgraced our deck^ 
Fathers from their children wiestedJ 



"Spare! I cried, Oh ! spare my brother? 

Spare hini for a parent's sake ! 
Save ! Oh ■ save him ! cried my mother. 

Or his sister's hrart v;iil break,' 

Smiling pirates ' they but mcckM us: 
Laugh'd at fond affections grief ! 

And with brutal language shock'd us. 
While we wept without ie)ief ? 

But when from us they departed, 
Shrieks of angnih pietc'dth*-- air' 

'J'hen ra\ mother broken hearted, 
Fell, the victim of despair ? 

Pity, then, a hapless stranger, 
Frindless on a t:M eigo slu-re ! 

O, protect a maid fr.in danger, 
Who for comfo't looks no more • 

Cl7'lZLS. 

Ves, fair daughter of oppression i 
iLxile frrm Hibernians plains, 

VicLm of the cuis'd ?.ggressi<in, 
Which thef^ag of f'ecdom strains: 

Q 



182 

Here I swear to be thy brother ; 

See a sister in vt'.y wife ; 
Find a parent in my mother — 

I'll protect thee with my life. 



SELIM. 



The above emblematical verses give a glimpse of the 
tender mercies of ligitimate monarchy, and yet the million 
shut their eyes on this, and a thousand far far more fla- 
grant and brutal outrages on humanity. What dreadful 
darkness ! The English and Irish are proverbial for their 
love of country ; but alas ! too many of them cannot, or 
will not make a distinction between their tyrannical go- 
vernment and country. My limits v/ill not allow me to 
dwell on politics here, I have wrote hundreds of pages 
thereon already, and indeed it is a painful subject for me 
to think or write on, as the bloody sights exhibited there- 
by, are truly distressing. Ah ! if the brave people of Ire- 
land and England, once saw their errors in politics as I 
see them, they would forthwith individually say, and 
scalding tears of mortification would attend the words, 
" Aias^ oias, had J been as faithful to my God^ as I have 
been loynl to a royal booby ^ even the last fifty years^ he 
would not have left me in this labyrinth oj degradation^ 
desolation^ and starvation ^"while such men as the Lord Bi- 
shop of Waterford^ are rioting in extravagant sensuality y 
at the expense of my virtue^ liberty^ and independence »^ 
Ireland has produced more of the brightest and bravest 
men, for its circumference, thanany island in the world; and 
England, this moment, is favoured with a band of brave 
patriots, who boldly hold up a torch of political light to 
their degraded and distressed co-patriots, though impri- 
sonment and death threaten the brave and benevolent 
deed. But ah ! did these champions of liberty, a Cob- 
bett, a Cochrane, a Burdett, a Hunt, &c. &c. did they 
once see the impossibility of a corrupt fountain purging 
itself, or that the corrupt royal oak, could bring forth 
good fruit after even the branches were cut down ; did 
they and their co patriots come fully to the light in poli- 
tics, and see the idolatory, the absurdity, the inutility, 
the degredation, and extravagance of king-craft, soon 
would Ireland and England be in magnitude, what the 
Spartan and the Athenian republics were in minature, 
even when they were most pure and prosperous. 



188 

CHAPTER X. 

CONTEMPLATIONS ON COMPASSION. 

'•The heart that bleeds for others woes, 

Shall feel each selftsh sorrow less ; 
The breast that happiness bestows, 

Rc-acted happiness shall bluss." 

Few virtues practised by man, make him more esti- 
mable, amiable, and even God-like, than a compassionate 
disposition ; and nothing makes man more like a mon- 
ster, than the want of this virtue. There certainly was 
as great a contrast between the compassionate Samari- 
tan and the cruel Priest and Levite, as between two ty- 
gers and an Angel. I had almost said the real compas- 
sionate man, is a God in miniature ; at any rate, it is a 
celestial fire that kindles the flame of compassion in the 
human breast, and stimulates a man with the disposition 
virtually to circle all men in one kind embrace, as God 
literally circles his thousand worlds in one benign em- 
brace. I know a man, whose great frailty is an amorous 
disposition : yet would he be far sooner melted to com- 
passion at the sight of human misery, than to admira- 
tion at the sight ot female beauty. 

" X) glittering pearl which royal grandeur wears ; % 

No gem that hangs on the sweet virgin's breast ; 

No g' Men sfar, nor the pale queen of night, 

Shi e half so bright as the pathetic tears 

That flows down manly cheeks on suffering man." 

The man who wants compassion, wants the distin- 
guishing characteristic of his noble nature, and he has no 
more relish for the celestial pleasure of beneficence than 
a brute. The compassionate man will pity and relieve 
an insect, . more suddenly and more sweetly, than the 
cruel man will his own blood relation, or his own legiti- 
mate offspring. Alas ! why is it that there is so little of 
this celestial virtue among the professed disciples of the 
compassionate Jesus ? Where do we find one who sym- 
pathises and melts at human woe ? Where do we find » 



1B4 

CDmpassionate Lady GuioR, a benevolent Francis Xavier, 
who daily imitated their Saviour by going about doing- 
good to their unfortunate fellow mortals ? In modern 
times, I must confess^ I find very few blessed in any emi- 
nent degree Vfith this amiable disposition ; and none so 
much as the beneficent Richard Reynolds, the philanthro- 
pist oi' BristoL That the reader may see how much 
good a rich compassionate man may do, in his day and 
generation^, 1 v/iW give him a brief view of this amiable 
character, who let his light shme e-o conspicuous, that it 
vyill illuminate ages yet unborn. Yet, notwithstanding 
the beauty and brilliancy of his com^passion, it was only 
a spark compared to the Sun, when put in competitioa 
with the supreme compassion of the FATHER! the dy- 
ing love of the SON ! and the infinite pity of the HOLY 
GHOST! who patiently waits, perseveringly intreats, 
and most kindly woo's the obdurate and ungrateful sons 
of men, to seek their own happiness in the practice of vir- 
tue, oftimes from youth to old age, but alas ! he too often 
woo's in vain. They hear his celestial voice, but will 
not understand ; they feel the force of his heavenly truth, 
but turn from it and embrace the opposite error ; they 
see a glimmering beam of h>s divine light, hut loath even 
the glimpse, and turn to the opposite darkness. They 
wiU not receive this immaculate guest, because they are 
cruel and not eompassior^ate. And it is more impossi- 
ble for the spirit of truth t& dwell in any but a compae- 
SLpnate breast, than it is for a dove to take up its abode 
in the nest of a vulture I This Holy monitor is not only 
infinite in compassion, bijt also delicate in love ; and 
though he sympathiaes and melts at the sorrows of his 
compassionate votary, who feels, and weeps, and laments 
the infirmities of his nature, and is humbled and abased 
before God therefor, yet he no way in the world can re- 
main one hour, no not even one moment, in that heart 
which is ungrateful to God, or cruel to any of his crea- 
tures, animal or human. And where the tear of compas- 
sion steals from the tender eye of his obedient pupil, and 
flows spontaneous on the child of misfortune, although 
his ov.n deadly foe, like the tender tears of good Lou- 
yerture, this is of all sights on earth most agreeable to the 
Father, pleasureable to the Son, delightsome to the Holy 



185 

Spirit, and rapturous toour guardian angels in particular, 
and the heavenly host in general. Wlierefore, he who 
will be cruel, must live and die in darkness ; ^nor never 
have a glimpse of the sovereign beauty, the most beau- 
tilul trait in whose divine character is *^ infinite com- 
passion.^'* This is the naked truth,[though all men should 
disbelieve and disobey it. 

Although I dislike extolling any mortal, however wor- 
thy, and whether dead or alive, yet tht virtue of Richard 
Reynolds, was so pure in itself, so delicate in its adminis- 
tration, and is so scarce withal in this dark and selfish 
age, that I will transcribe his character as delivered at a 
meeting of his fellow citizens, convened for the purpose 
of forming a charitable institution to perpetuate his me- 
mory, and in some measure supply his loss. At which 
445/. sterling, was contributed to aid the funds of the 
" Reynolds Commemoration Society ^ The address to 
the Chairman of the meeting, Mr. Haythorn, as deliver- 
ed by W. Thorp, we will introduce as our concluding 
quotation.-* 

" Mr. Chairman — Sir Never surely were the inhabi- 
tants of Bristol convened upon a more solemn or a more 
affecting occasion than the present — to rerlder a grateful 
tribute of respect to one of the best of men, and to pe - 
peiuate the memory of a Philanthropist of singular and 
transcendant excellence. Thousands can testify that he 
\v as an ornament of our nature — an honour to our citv~ 
the glory of the Society to which he belonged— and a 
blessing to the empire and the world. When the eye 
saw him it blessed him — when the ear h^^ard him, it bare 
him witn^'ss ; he was eyes to the blind and feet to the* 
lame ; the cause which he knew not^ he searched cw?— he 
made thv- widow's heart to sing for joy ; and the blessing 
of the outcast orphan, ready to perish, came upon him. 
He is now gone to that country, from whose bourne no 
traveller returns ; and while Bristol, with her widuws 
and her orphans, are weeping over his ashes, the whole 



* For errata see page 191. 
<L2 



186 

nation has reason to lament bis departure. That depar- 
ture, however, was attended with many alleviating cir- 
cumstances, which, although they may deepen our sen- 
sibility, are calculated to assuage the violence of our 
grief. We sorrow not for this righteous man, as those 
that have no hope. We entertain the faith of christians, 
and cannot give place to the despair cf heathens. He 
hath rested from his labours and his works shall follow 
him— not to procure his title, but to prove his right to 
the Tree of Life, and to enter within the gates of theJHea-. 
venly Jerusalem. We adore that kind and indulgent 
Providence, which spared his valuable life for so many 
years, and thus permittctd him to mature those plans 
which he had projected for the relief of misery, ages aftey 
his decease. We congratulate our fellow-citizens on the 
honour they have done to themselves, by assembling this 
day to embalm his memory with their tears — to catch 
with his falling mantle, the sacred flame that glowed with 
rich fervor in his bosom — and to do what within them 
lies to give immortality to a name so dear and so vene- 
rable. That we may be enabled with more facility to 
transcribe his virtues and copy his example, let ms revievy 
the characters of that benevolence by which he was so 
eminently distinguished. 

" The benevolence of Richard Reynolds, Sir, was of ths 
highest orde?. It was liberal, diffusive, universal — Not 
narrowed by party prejudice, nor bounded by the limits 
of party connections, k e.^braced the Family of Man — 
yea, the whole circle of living beings, endowed with a 
capacity of pleasure or of pair?. 5n its contemplation of 
the vast, however, it did not overlook the minute ; in its 
comprehension of the whole, it did not, like the modern 
philosophy, neglect the parts of which that whole is com- 
posed. Its operations were regulated by the respective 
claims o{ nature, of gratitude, ot friendship, of consan- 
guinity, of religious connections, of moral worth, and of 
various degrees of wretchedness ai-siongst the unhappy 
•bjects upon whom his bounty was bestowed. 

Proceeding, in the first instance, from compassion, it 
was afterwards purified by religious principle, and 
streEgthened by a sense of his awful responsibility to tk« 



187 

great Lord of AH for the talent with which he was en- 
trusted. Compassion, improperly cultivated, degene- 
rates into an useless sensibility. The pleasure that at- 
tends it, soothes and deceives the heart. An interesting 
apcount of human wretchedness excites its pleasurable 
sympathetic emotions : the tongue utters the law of kind- 
ness ; the man exults in his own virtuous sensibility, and 
thus becomes the dupe of self-deception. But to enter 
the abodes of the wretched — to examine into debts, and 
wants, and diseases — to encounter loathsome sights, and 
endure offmsive smells within the very sphere of infec- 
tion ; to give time, and thought, and talent, and labour, 
and property — this is the substance and not the shadow 
of virtue : the pleasure of sensiljility may be greater; but 
greater also is the danger of self-deceit. Death-bed 
scenes, eloquently described, delight the imagination ; but 
they who are most delighted, are not always the first to 
visit a dying neighbour, and sit up all night, and wipe 
away the cold sweat, and moisten the parched lip, and 
remove the phlegm, and contrive easy postures, and bear 
with fretfulness, and drop the pious thought, and console 
the departing spirit ! Ah no. These boasted children 
of sentimental benevolence, may often repair to the tem- 
ple of virtue, but not to sacrifice. Kxtreme sensibility is 
a mental disease; it unfits us for relieving the miserable, 
and tempts us to turn away, like the cold hearted Priest 
and Levrte. It avoids the sight, and suppresses the 
thought of pain — stops the ears to tl>e cry of indigence, 
passes by the house of mournmg, and abandons the near- 
est friends, when sick, to the care oi the nurse and the 
phvTician; and when dead to those who mourn for hire. 
And all this under the pretence of delicacy of feeling, and 
a tender heart ! Such was not the benevolence of the Bris- 
tol Philanthropist. Those acts of bounty which flow 
from the influence of sensibility, soon fail ; I'hke the good 
seed fallen. on stony ground, they soon spring np, and 
as soon wither. But the benevolence of Richard Rey- 
nolds, purified, strengthened, and animated by^Christian 
principle, was steady, vmiform and persevering. Ntither 
ingratitude, nor imposture, nor opposition, nor even the 
frost of itge, could c}\\]{ Us ardours or relax its exertions 
It Nvas active atid industrious. His eloquence was not 



188 

that of words, but that of deeds. He said little, but he 
did much. He left others to define benevolence ; he stu- 
died the practice of it. While the child of sensibility 
was weeping, he was extending relief. While philoso- 
phers were disputing whether philanthropy arose from 
selfishness, or instinctive tenderness, or modes of educa- 
tion, or the force of early and local associations, or ffom 
the combined influence of all these causes — heedless of 
their contentions, he was exemplifying in real life, pri- 
vately, and before the world, the character of a true phi- 
lanthropist. Their speculation he reduced to action ; 
their abstract notions he embodied ; and to their airy 
nothings, he gave notonly a local habitation, but a reality, 
a substance, and a form. Like his beloved Master, 
whose spirit he had imbibed, and whose example he 
closely copied, he went about continually doing good, 

" His benificence was guided by wisdom and discretion. 
It was not scattered promiscuously and at random, but 
bestowed upon such objects, and in such a way, as he 
deemed, (and he was a most excellent judged the most 
effective in promoting the individual and general good. 
To furnish employment for the healthy and the strong ; 
to supply the wants of the really indigent and necessi- 
tous ; to ease the aching heart of the father, who after 
toiling the live-long day, finds, instead of rest at home, 
that he is called to bear, what he is least able to bear, the 
cries of a numerous family, demanding bread, when he 
has none to give ; to assuage the sorrows of poverty, 
£)vertaken'by sickness, or overwhelmed with misfortune j 
to smooth the furrowed cheek, and make the winter of age 
wear the aspect of spring ; to act the part of a father to 
helpless orphans, on whom no parent of their own ever 
smiled ; to supply the want of sight to the blind, feet to 
the lame, and speech to the dumb ; to rescue vice from 
guilt, and infamy and ruin ; and during the season, af- 
ford a shelter from the fury of the storm; to relieve the 
distress, and yet spare the blushes of those who have 
known better days, by administering that bounty, which, 
they in the time of their prosperity were ready to admi- 
nister to others — these were the employments of Richard 
^Reynolds — these the objects of his beneficence — these 



189 

were the offices of mercy, in which he delighted I His 
heart told hirn what to do; his conscience- as the Vice- 
gerent of Hcavtn, reminded him of the claims of moral 
obligation, and insisted that it must i)e done. His head 
devised the means, and arranged the plan of action ; and 
his hands, obedient to the dictates of his heart, and the 
mandates of conscience, were ever ready to execute the 
plans which his head had formed. Thus his whole 
existence was consecrated to the cause of benevolence ! 
If we love the modesty which concealed the hand that 
bestowed the princely donation, we revere the courage 
which occasionally stepped forward.to avow himself the 
donor, when his design was to stimulate others to follow 
his example. His whole conduct was marked by the 
most consummate wisdom ; and left us at a loss whether 
to admire most the benevolence of his heart, or the power 
of his understanding — the deeds of mercy which he per- 
formed, or the manner in which he performed them. 

" All his prudence and benevolence was adorned with 
modesty and humility. So far was he from being infla- 
ted with the pride of wealth, that he spoke the genuine 
sentiments of his heart, when he said to a friend who ap- 
plied to him with a case of distress, " My talent is the 
meanest of all talents — a little sordid dust : but the man 
in the parable, who had but one talent, was accountable : 
and for the talent that I possess, humble as it is, I am 
also accountable to the great Lord of All." His bounty 
was not the result of fear, like the obedience of a slave, 
who tremi^les under the scourge of a haughty tyrant. It 
was not excited by the prospect of remuneration, nor 
extorted by the dread of punishment, nor performed with 
a view to 7nerit an inheritance in the kingdom of HeaVen. 
All such sentiments he rejected with abhorrence — placed 
his whole dependence for eternal life upon the Sovereiga 
mercy of God, through the propitiating sacrifice of his 
Redeemer ; and if the Gates of Heaven had been closed, 
and the flames of Hell extinguished, he would have 
loved mercy, and delighted in acts of charity ! He laid 
claim to no distinctions, assumed no airs of superiority 
and never attempted to catch the public eye, by an osten- 
tatious display of extraordinary excellence. His good- 
ness often descended in secret^ and like the l^rovidtnce 



Qf Heaven, concealed the hand that sent the relief. He 
was a burning and a shining light, and would have no 
man know it. But he could not be hid. To hide good- 
ness like his, was impossible. How have I seen the good 
man shrink within himself, and his venerable counte- 
nar :e crimsoned with the blush of modesty, when the 
mention of his name has been hailed in this place, with a 
thunder of applause ! 

" His charity was of Heavenly origin, and bore'the im- 
press of his Maker's Image. It was derived from an 
immediate union with the greatest of all Beings, and the 
fountain of all happiness ; and as the mind naturally as- 
similates itself to those objects with which it is familiar- 
ly conversant, by immediate intercourse with his God, he 
caught the resemblance of his glory. For God is Love ; 
and he that dwelleth in Love, dwelleth in God, and God 
in him. His body was the temple of the Holy Ghost ; 
built indeed with a lowly roof, but attended with Che- 
rubim and Seraphim. There an altar was erected to 
the living God, whence the flame of devotion, and the 
incense of praise ascended day and night. In the Tem- 
ple, as in the Jewish Sanctuary, the Shekinah, the visible 
symbol of a present Deity, was enshrined above the mer- 
cy seat, and occasionally shone forth, and shed a glory all 
around. In his measure he was filled with the fullness 
of God. 

** No wonder if benevolence like his was a source of hap- 
piness to himself, as well as of relief to others. It was 
a spring shut up — a fountain sealed — a garden enclosed, 
which the eagle's eye never saw, and the foot of the un- 
clean heast never trod. Enamoured with the charms of 
Virtue, he delighted to behold her native beauties, and to 
jobey her sweet commands. He practised benevolence 
ffor the sake of the pleasure with which the practice of 
jit was attended. He felt a luxury in doing good, and he 
^determined to enjoy that luxury. His own experience 
taught him, that the God of Mercy, who formed the 
heart of man to be the dispenser of his bounty, has or- 
dained, that like the vital fluid, which goes from the 
heart, to diffuse life and genial warmth through the 
whole system, it should return, in the course of circula- 
tion, notj^ impoverished, but enriched, to the source 



191 

whence 4t flowed. His goodness might sometimes be 
requittea with evil, but this moved him not. He knew 
that no deei! ot mercy could be wasted ; that some mi- 
nistering angel is stationed in every department of the 
moral workl, to gather up the fragments that fall from 
the table of benevolence, that nothing may be lost. Ac- 
tuated by these noble principles, he held on his glorious 
career, still scattering blessings around him, tmtil he re- 
signed his meek and gentle spirit, into the hands of his 
redeemer ; to enjoy the fullness of his love, and to be- 
hold the brightness of his glory, in the regions of eternal 
day. By relieving the miserable, he made himself 
friends of the mammon of unrighteousness, many, of 
whom had gone before him, and have now hailed him, 
as their benefactor, on his arrival into everlasting habita- 
tions." 

I have now said nearly all I have liberty to say. I 
will send out an edition of 3000 copies of my book, 
among its enemies, the sons of error, like a spark on the 
tempestuous ocean, or rather like a sample o'f the healing 
herbage of South America, provided by nature as a 
sure antidote for the diseases of wild Indians and ani- 
mals, hoping some unfortunate person may be enlighten- 
ed to see its .utility, and may reap a lasting benefit 
therefrom. My last admonition is this. (Q^ LET NO 
MAN CONSIDER A^Y ACTION (however good 
in itself) VIRTUOUS, UNLESS IT IS DONE 
PURELY TO PLEASE GOD ALONE ! ! 

Philadelphia^ Mondaij nighty April 7, 1817. 

Errata — At the end »>f chap. 8th, page 178, I intended to have 
introduced the 14th chapter uf St. Paul's Epistle to the Corin- 
thians, in order to shew the wonderful contrast between the pre- 
sent and prinnitive mode of Christian worship, as I proposed in 
page 177 ; but I neglected to do so at the proper place, which I 
will be-g leave to correct f rthwith. 

** I ihank my God, I speak with tongues more than you 
all : Yttt in the church I had rather speak five words with my 
understanding, ^hat by my voice I might teach others also, than 
ten thousand words in a:i unknown tongue. Let the prophets 
speak two or three, and let the other judge ; if any thing be re- 
vealed tf another that passe h by, let the first hold his peace ; 
for ye rn-iy all prophesy one by one, th3t all may learn, and all 
may be co'uioried ; and the spirits of the prophets are subject 
to the prophrt*^ : for God is not the author of confusion, but of 
pecae, as in all churches of the saints.'* 



SOME CAUSES 



OF 



POPULAR POVERTY, 

DERIVED FROM 

HE ENRICHING NATURE OF INTERESTS, RENTS, DU- 
TIES, INHERITANCES, AND CHURCH ESTABLISH. 
MENTS, 

INVESTIGATED IN THEIR 

PRINCIPLES AND CONSEQUENCES, 

AND AGREEMENT WITH 

SCRIPTURE. 



By C. C. BLATCHLEY, J^ew-Tork, 



The destruction of the floor is their fiovtrty. — Solomon. 



*' All public measures which are not strlctTy equitable, are des- 
truct vf- of the true end of civil goveruraent." — Occasional r^ec- 
tions of George DiUioyny page 46. 



i8ir. 



APPENDICES TO '' THE PLEASURES OF CONTEM- 
PLATION." 

THE foregoing pages were once precipitately wrote, and but 
once read in MSS. by myself alone, previous to going to press. 
They are of course very imperfect. Domestic avocations, withihe 
losses I have met with, and the pressure of the times»^recluded me 
not obly from correcting obvious inaccuracies in composition, but 
also from putting down many interesting thoughts which perio- 
dically struck my mind, connected with the subject of our inves- 
tigation. I have attempted to demonstrate in the antecedent pages, 
(I hope to the satisfaction of all) that there is snch a thing 
iQ the world as pure religion — alias, real virtue, notwithstand- 
ing the impure and absurd opinions attached to it by the sons of 
error, and which greatly dishonour it ; although they all will 
tell you they take revelation for their criterion. I have endea- 
voured to shew that God sometimes reveals his supreme beauty 
and sovereign truth to those who sincerely love him without the 
medium of words or sounds. Finally, that the soul which is un- 
prejudiced and disinterested in its belief and affections, and is, in 
one ^t rd, the temple of the spirit of truth, can even in this vale 
cf tears, this world of corruption, practice all the humane and so- 
cial virtues, with the view of pleasing God alone, as every thing 
we do without this single intention and pure motive, I contend is 
anti-religious, anti-virtuous. There are a number of quotations 
in the foregoing pages which, though carefully marked as such 
with inverted commas, yet some I have intentionally transposed 
to suit my purpose, and others which I transcribed frem memory 
without knowing the name of the author, or even the book, 
where I read the same, are no doubt iitroduced with considera- 
ble variations, which certainly requires an apology, as well as 
the obvious totology and many deviations from the radical rules 
of composition in the antecedent pages. With respect to Dr. 
Blatchley*s ingenious and benevolent remarks, I must say that 
they need no apology, neither as to matter or composition — espe- 
cially when it is remembered that he is not in the habit of wri- 
ting for the press. Did my readers know the character of this 
*' Friend " as well as 1 do, they would no doubt feel interested 
while perusing his benevolent observations on the causes of "Po- 
pular Poverty.'* I really know no man in America who is more 
liberal and philanthropic in his intercourse with men. whether as 
a physician, a minister of the gospel, or a private citizen, than Dr. 
Blatchley. His writing the following strictures at my simple re- 
quest, shiws the urbanity of his disposition. The cause of my re- 
quest was as follows : the Dr. wrote me a friendly letter about ten 
months ago, wherein he lamented, in the most pathetic manner, 
the distresses of the poor, and pointed out some causes that natu- 
rally produce these fatal effects, which I read with much inte- 
rest, and in a moment recognized their utility as well as origina- 
lity, and forthwith requested him to write me an enlarged disser- 
tation on the same subject which I proposed to intrcdtice in .my 
next publication. He freely granted my request, and I as freely 
and plea5ureably comply vvith my propositior;, and forthwith in- 
troduce the subsequent interesting document as an appendice to 
the ' Pleasures of Contemplation.' 



IKTRODUCTION. 



THOUGH the oppressions of the poor and sigh'ir.;j;3 
of the needy, arise from a multiplicity of circumstances, 
yet the following, among other causes, demand particu- 
lar attention ; because they have attracted too little at- 
tention. The}' aie these : 1st, Interests. 2d, Rents. 
3d, Dutieii. 4th, Inheritances. 5th, Churches established 
by laws of men. I have here viewed them theoretically, 
practically, and scripturally. 

Every evil disposition of the heart, and every errone- 
ous principle of the mind, when brought into action, ha- 
bit, and custom, oppresses and more or less destroys, ci- 
vil and religious light, liberty, happiness, and prosperity. 
Where is there a single perverse propensity, or errone- 
ous principle of action, that has not led its votaries to the 
commission of every kind of sin against the creator, and 
every kind of iniquity against the creature, which has 
groaned in bondage from the fall of man to the present 
day ? The history of them would fill volumes, and each 
of them deserves one to teach by examples and facts, 
how greatly error and vice ought to be feared and avoid- 
ed. What oppressions, persecutions, and destruction of 
the human species have been produced by ambition, by 
pride, by vanity, by resentment and anger, by false ho- 
nour and glory, by coveteousness, by luxury, by sexual 
lust, by drunkenness, by gaming, horse- racing, cock-fight- 
ing, bull-beating, boxing, and other undue pleasures and 
pursuits, by fear of man, by erroneous hopes, by errone- 
ous fears, by false principles in domestic, political, and 
religious matters. Pagans have oppressed the Jews and 
Christians; Christians, so called, have persecuted and 
slain Pagan, Jew, and Turk ; Mahometans have trod 
in the same path ; and the world has, for thousands of 
years, been an acceldama, a golgotha, a scene of slavery 
and tyranny, and a house of miserable lamentation and 
heart-rending afflictions. 

I have not time, abilities, nor opportunities to go in- 
to the detail of these things ; and must leave them to 
the reader's reflecUoas, while he notices, with me, simi- 



196 

Idr evils in the subjects I have already proposed to cou- 
sider, and which are not reprobated, but generally es- 
teemed salutary regulations. The slave trade was lately 
esteemed to be judicious and beneficial, because its prin- 
ciple, practice^ and consequences, had not been duly in- 
vestigated. Duelling and war are now under public 
consideration, and are likely to become more abhorrent 
than the trade in flesh and souls of human beings. I 
hope commerce in luxuries w^ill, in due time, be consi- 
dered as a desolating evil. Great Britain is said to im- 
port annually 20 millions of pounds sterling in articles 
she ought to disuse such as tea, tobacco, ardent spirits, 
&c. Commerce should be restricted to things neces- 
sary, useful, and convenient ; its excess is a vice that 
produces the most serious and destructive consequen- 
ces in individuals and states. 



197 

SECTION 1. 

OF INTERESTS AND RENTS. 

THESE are so intimately connected, that they rest 
on the same foundation, and grow from the same stock. 
They arc grounded on the following principle — ** That 
wealth should generate more wealth." It is necessary to 
investigate the equity of this proposition. If wealth 
should produce opulence without the art, labour, or in- 
genuity of its proprietor, the opulent owner must neces- 
sarily obtain his increase from those who exercise art, 
labour and ingenuity, and he may, without any exercise, 
study, genius, or industry, continually receive the pro- 
ducts of other people's exertions ; and he will necessarily 
accumulate property, and this will necessarily increase 
his income, till he or his posterity are plunged into luxu- 
ry, excess, extravagance, and other abominable vices, 
that shall, like a whirlwind, scatter his golden feathers 
among others. By vices are they dispersed, but by 
what virtues were they collected ? That money maif be 
gotten by honest industry is certiin and undeniable : but 
it is as certain and undeniable, that millions of industri- 
ous and frugal people toil from imbecile youth to decri- 
pid age, without being able to obtain riches. 

If the wealth of nations proceed from mental and cor- 
poral industry, (and no intelligent person v/ill pretend to 
deny that it does, *' all that we have, proceed from in- 
dustry," says the poet Thompson;) those things must 
be very unjust in their nature, which prevents the sober, 
frugal, and industrious poor from becoming easy in their 
outward circumstances. If the labour and diligence of 
the hand and head produce the richos and prosperity of 
civilized nations ,* should not every wise, just, and hu- 
mane governor and legislator encourage and recompenso 
the artists, scif.ntifics, and labourers, who enrich the na- 
tions i And if their industry and labours arc the soU 
causes of the opulence of nations, either remotely or im- 
mediately, they are the sole persons who ought to in- 
crease in opulence. But by interest and rcr.ts, we sec 



198 

the luxurious, the lazy, £he idle, the extravagant and iiS- 
jurious, who ^re wise enough to keep within a vast in- 
come, bask in the sunshine ot" pleasures and vanities, ad- 
ding houses to houses, and lands to lands, as mentioned 
in the proph€t. If they who beneficed general society 
were the only persons rewarded for thf ir diligence, in- 
genuity, and labour, industry would be rewarded and 
thrive ; and indolence be punished by poverty. Thus 
men in^ this, as well as in the next world, would be re- 
warded according to their works. 

Rents of houses and lands, and interest of money, are 
probably the effects of ancient usurpation, tyranny, and 
conquest. An usurper, who subjects a nation of indivi- 
duals under his authority, exacts, for himself and com- 
peers, pecuniary assistance. He knows that money is as 
power, and he must have it by force or contrivance.-— 
Anciently a conqueror, considered the lives, liberty, and 
property of the vanquished as his own. This was the 
spirit of the barbarians who overthrew the Roman em- 
pire, and conquered Europe. The lands became the 
property of the victorious, and the inhabitants were ensla- 
ved. Their lords, dakes, earls, barons, &c. therefore 
demanded fealty, homage, knight-fees, personal services 
and rents.* Such practices in Russia, and other realms, 
are not yet wholly abrogated nor ended : when custom 
sanctions what vice and usurpation forced into practice, 
then the iniquity appears just and equitable. They ful- 
filled the nth verse of the 49th Psalm. Read it. 

Rights to property have been derived not only from 
compulsive power, but from Papal assumption. When 
Columbus discovered the new continent, the Pope 
claimed it as the lawful proprietor, (jure divino) by a 
divine right. How popes or kings can prove their di- 
vine rights, by indubitable evidence, I leave to politi- 
cians and enthusiasts to make known, and enforce by 



* The Ceorls (or distant peasants) paid the feudal lords all 
profits The villains (or domestic peasants) were eye-slavess of 
th>^ same lords. The vaasals were their land tenants. The king 
was prnprif tor of all s iil. Then an acre of land of the best kiud 
sold for no more^ihan four sheep. 



199 

compulsion and delusion. These may plunder Hindos- 
tan other riches, the American aborigines ul thtir lands, 
and rob Africa of her inhabitants, and wipe avvuy the 
iniquity of these acts by a divine right ; which, as it pro- 
ceeds from goodness and irom God, must be good and 
godly. But if it is neither one or the other, it must be 
diabolical, and be derived from an opposite origin and 
power. 

Kings, as well as popes, have claimed a similar title to 
things by the right of discovery. By this right Spain, 
Portugal. Holland, &c. assumed dominion over various 
parts of America, New- Holland, South sea Islands, &c. 
Having powder to enforce their assumed rights, the evil 
tree grew, and the aboriginal occupants of the soil have, 
in various ways and instances, eaten the better fruits of 
their avarice and power, and were slaughtered in war 
and oppressed in peace. New England, Virginia, and 
other places, felt the consequences of these usurpations. 
Though Pennsylvania was ceded by the crown ot Eng- 
land to VVm. Penn, his enlightened conscience informed 
him, he ought to purchase the truer title of occupancy 
from the native possessors ot the soil. He was, there- 
fore, beloved by them, and enjoyed the territory in 
peace. He detested the policy and conduct of Cortes at 
Mexico, for his soul was united to God, who is love, 
truth, justice, and benevolence. 

My idea of title may be found in Moses' account of 
man's creation. Man, created a little lower than the 
angels, had dominion given to him, (not in his individual, 
but in his aggregate capacity,) over every living thing; 
whether animal or V(^getable. If individuals usurp, 
what is the divine right only of the aggregate, they de- 
prive man (a term ineluding all men and women,) of his 
rights and privileges granted him in the beginning by 
God^ his creator, and the sole proprietor of angtls, men, 
beasts, birds, fishes,, serpents, insects, vegetables, mine- 
rals, lands, seas, air, and heavens. For his glory, we 
are told, they are and were created. All men should, 
therefore, esteem themselves as deriving their titles 
from him, {or general use and benv^fit, and not for i;7r/i- 
yzfi^i/a/ aggrandize rn( nt and oppression .f the multitude. 
And as Adam and Eve, and th«ir children were the first 



200 

occupants, occupancy was the next title man had to the 
habitable earth. The improvement, use, and multipHca- 
tion of the productions of the earth, seas, and air, by in- 
dustry, art, and ingenuity, is a third and equitable title to 
the things of this world. I know of no other titles to pro- 
perty, that is truly righteous and beneficial to the great 
family of the w^hole w^orld. And if there is no other 
righteous right, or true titles, what must we think of the 
interest or increase of money, goods, houses, and lands, 
for the benefit, not of the aggregate association, nor the 
occvpant^ nor the artist, improver, and cultivator, but for 
the benefit of some opulent individual or family, who 
claim titles to more than they possess, occupy, use, and 
cultivate, except by the tenure and labor of others. 

Interest for moveable property, rents for immovable 
estates, the incomes of banking companies, and similar 
methods of increasing property out of all proportion to 
the cost, ingenuity, and labor connected with such things, 
ought to be deemed unjust, and injurious to the human 
family : but just and politic as far as they are connected 
with the public good, and private occupancy, labour, and 
improvement of the claimants. 

Being unjust, and consequently pernicious, what has 
been the fact as well as the theory of these things ? Rol- 
lin answers in his ancient history, that those nations that 
allow the greatest interest are the soonest precipitated 
into the abyss of destruction. Where is there an older 
empire than that of China's three hundreds of millions 
of people ? It is reputed to have stood from the days 
of Socrates, or Esdras, to the present day, which is above 
two thousand years. But China is said to have been, till 
latterly, opposed to usury or increase. " Usury,'* says 
M'Cartney, is like gaming, a dishonourable mode of get- 
ting money ! Vices, in exct- ss, are the rapid destruction 
of nations as well as individuals : but if national or indi- 
vidual unrighteousnesses are moderate, they are only mo- 
derately hurtful, yet all vices oppress, and each is a ty- 
rant. Abundance of tyrants, vices, and oppressions are 
begotten by an abundant excess of riches in the hands of 
the few who are thereby often rendered proud, haughty, 
luxurious, profligate, lustful and inhuman. Abundance 
of riches flow into the coflers of the opulent from the hire 



201 

of lands and houses, and from the interest, use, or usury 
of money. 

The interest of /" 100,000 a year, at six per cent, is 
yf 6000 annually. It the rich gain and receive this, of 
whom do they extract this sum. it not irom the industri- 
ous and the poorer class, and give them this oppressive 
annual tax ? This, however, is so concealed by its re- 
mote and complicated mode of action, that the indigent 
part of society dont know the harm of it, and, therefore, 
never think ot raising their voice against it. 1st. The 
borrower of money must pay his interest, and he must 
even profit by the loan ; to profit by the loan he must op- 
press those he deals with. 2dly, And these again oppress 
odiers. Thus the oppression begins in the opulent drone 
and descends from richer to poorer regularly down to 
the most needy class of society, who, oppressed to the 
utmost, starve, or toil night and day, winter and 
summer, in foul ar i fair weather, year after year, till 
they drop exhausted, poor, and wretched, into the silent 
tomb, unless previously slaughtered by their severities. 
If a poor man gets, by muscular labour £50^ or the hun- 
dredth part of six thousand pounds annually, he has rea- 
son, in the present state of social law and custom, to 
bless Goci — and I trust he does as mUch as he who pos- 
sesses ten thousand times as much, and receives annually a 
hundred timts his wages, though wholly idle,or, if in trade, 
this divers may be accumulating by it, from those who 
are ultimately needy, ten hundred times as much, or a 
y grer.t deal more. 

Psalm 15. — '' Lord, who shall abide in thy tabernacle t 
who sh ill dwejl in thy holy hill ?" 

Answer — •** He chat walketh uprightly, and worketh 
righteousness, and speaketh truth in his heart. He that 
putteth not out his money to usury or increase, nor tak- 
eth reward against the innoeent." 

Note, that usury^ in Scripture language, as well as 
among Romans and Jews, meant the increase of goods or 
mo. ey ; the Interest, or the reward paid by the user to 
the owner. " Usurce usiirdrum^^ was interest on in- 
terest, increase upon inert a-^e, or use upon use. Usarcc 
(jfuincunx^ was five per cent interest among the Latins. 



2&2 

Among the Hebrews, God commanded by Moses, Lev* 
25, 36, &c. " Take no usury, or increase^ (that is inter- 
jfcst or rent) of thy poor brother ; thou shalt not give him 
thy money on usury, nor lend him thy victuals for in- 
crease,"*^ By a statute of Henry VIII. "no person was 
permitted to lend any sum of money for any usury or in- 
crease^ to be received above the sum lent, upon pain of 
forfeiting the sum lent and the increase^ with fine and 
imprisonment, at the king's pleasure. This may help to 
confirm the preceding ideas on interest and usury ; and 
that usury formerly, and in Scripture, meant interest.'^ 

If the true title to landed estate be, as I have stated, 
derived 1st, from God's gift, 2d, from occupancy, and 3d, 
from improvement, then it is evident that rents of land- 
ed property, bear a close relation to money on interest. 
If a land claimer is esteemed proprietor of thousands of 
acres in our unsettled territories, or a great landholder of 
a number of farms, which he cannot work himself, by 
what good right does either claim title to such lands ? I do 
not perceive 1st, that God has given it to him more than 
to another ; 2dly, to one who does not occupy it, or 3d, 
to one who cannot work it, in preference to an industri- 
ous family who can occupy and use it, and has no farm of 
his own to improve. To make this destitute and indus- 
trious man farm for the opulent one, appears to me ex- 
tortionate and improper. What any man, however, has 
expended on any farm or house, or other thing, whose 
occupancy and improvement he chooses to relinquish, 
should be valued and paid to the person that relinquishes, 
by every person who thinks it his interest to occupy and 
continue to use and improve the farm. Hence we see 
the propriety of every proprietor and possessor of a house 
and lot in a town or city, being paid for it when he ab'an- 



*G. N. Bleecker, comptroller of the Treasury of New-York, 
mentions in his report of 1816, an oppressive interest to be paid 
by this city anmially, to wit : The interest of 638,000 dollars, and 
of 167,345 dollars in bonds, which, at six per cent, is 48,320 dol- 
lars. Such an interest must produce a very impoverishing tax on 
common people, while it enriches the fund holders, &c. Riches 
in some always attend equal poverty in others. Hence England's 
distre??. 



203 

dons it, or receiving a moderate sum, annually, till the 
house and improvement is paid for, but for no longer pe- 
riod of time. The payment of twelve years rent was 
once the English price of lands ; then a twenty years ten- 
ant deserves what he has occupied and improved. 

Money, goods, and lands, are intended to be used ; 
and they who cannot occupy and use them, should let 
those hold and improve them who can and desire to. But 
the avaricious spirit of the world, which craves what 
justly belong to others, will be opposed to such princi- 
ples and practice, and object many plausible difficulties 
that I cannot now attend to obviate and remove. I hope 
the humane will obviate them. 

As far as the banking system is a system of putting 
out money on interest^ it ought to be placed on the same 
basis of interests and rents. But as it goes still farther, 
and issues paper to several times the amount of the spe- 
cie-stock, it becomes so many times the more unjust. 
The issue of paper, so as to circulate double the quantity 
of money that circulated in specie, before the issue of 
paper, depreciates the value of all monies one half. All 
persons beside bankers are thereby materially injured ; 
but bankers are as greatly benefited by doubling and 
threbling their stock of specie. The loss and gain be- 
tween the bankers and the rest of the community is re- 
ciprocated inversely. What the first gains the latter 
looses. The more scarce money or goods are, the more 
valuable they are : and the contrary of the proposition is 
exactly as true. Before Spain possessed the silver mo- 
nies of Potose, money in Europe was scarce and valua- 
ble. In the commencement of the christian sera, the 
price of a day's labour was a penny. The silver penny 
was 10 assez, or 132 mills. The widow's mite cast into 
the treasury was a mill and a half; yet it was all her liv- 
ing: In Alfred's days, A. D. 1000, money was very 
scarce ; for an ox sold for two shilhngs and six-pence on- 
ly. In the time of Henry 1st, A. D. 1113, the price of 
an ox was three shillings. In the time of Richard 1st, it 
had risen to five shillings. A sheep sold for ten-pence 
if the wool was fine, and six-pence if not so ; but it 
should be noted that a pound sterling was a troy pound 
weight of silver. No banks existed at that time ; and 



204 

specie was scarce. Banks, by increasing monies, de^re- 
elate their value. 

DUTIES, he. 

Duties are another method of injuring and oppressing 
the poorer classes of the human family. Taxes should 
be proportioned to the estimated worth of every man's 
property. It is not right to tax the poor as much as the 
rich ; which is, in effect done, by duties on the necessa- 
ries and conveniencies of life. The lower grades of so- 
oiety, who use sugars, coffees, teas, cotton, linen and 
woollen cloths, &ev pay in duties, if they purchase of 
these and such articles, the same tax that the opulent 
pay for the purchase of the same necessaries and conve- 
niencies of life. They also pay the same taxes on books, 
cutlery, hardware, &c. If the farms of persons in com- 
mon circumstances, and their horses, horn-cattle, sheep, 
&c. are taxed, though the farmer may be greatly in debt 
by a recent purchase of them, while a wealthy man, who 
has his property in bonds, cash, notes, and mortgages, is 
not taxed ; this is surely not a small injustice. A tax 
of a certain rate per cent ad valorem^ would be just, open, 
and candid : — but duties, excises, and x\\t like, appear to 
be unjust, sly, and underhanded. It is taxing the com- 
monality without their knowledge. It is a way among 
many others of impoverishing the indigent laborers who 
enrich the more informed and wealthy drones of the na- 
tional hive. In a representative republic, like this, one 
would have thought that property, as well as men, would 
have a proportional representation and taxation. 

If all duties, excises, taxes, and civil revenue ultimate- 
ly fall on the consumer, agreeably to the doctrine of po- 
litical economists, men are obliged now to pay revenue 
to government, not according to their ability and wealth, 
but according to their consumption of the articles of so- 
ciety. This is unjust ; for the poor must eat, drink, and 
clothe themselves, oi suffer. 

IMIKRITANCES. 

Thouc^h New- York, New- Jersey, and other states di- 
vide intestates property equally, yet Inheritances have 



;S05 • 

usually been more confined to men than women ; and to 
the first son in preference to all the others. They have 
also been more partial to the opulent, than to needy 
or worthy people. Justice seems to require a different 
law and custom, than this feudal one. 

If property is considered in respect to its origin, it is 
social and individual : being the result and fruits of social 
protection, policy, and assistance, or of individual care, 
wisdom, and industry. The civil united interest of so- 
ciety is one of the great sources of civilization, and of 
wealth and property. What could an unprotected indi- 
vidual do to acquire, preserve, or retain property, where 
no social government, civilization, and protection exist- 
ed ? The answer is not difficult on comparing the wan- 
dering savage of the wilderness with a civilized and well 
regulated nation ; and by such a view \ve may perceive 
that society is the principal origin, and that to social 
union and wisdom we owe almost every thing ; even eve- 
ry thing that distinguishes the civilized from the most 
destitute, solitary, degraded, and ignorant savages of any 
country. If we owe so much to social union, and if our 
individual all, is from it, is not our individual all in a 
measure due to it ? does it not belong to it ? — and conse- 
quently to its disposal, as soon as death severs any indi- 
vidual of us from social rights and privileges ? That so- 
ciety thus considers this matter, is evident from its regu- 
lating the properties of departed souls defunct ; and how 
and liy whom they may be willed and inherited. 

The laws of inheritances are very different in different 
nations ; as justice, ambition, whim, and selfishness dic- 
tated. In China, women inherit nothing. In England^ 
the eldest son inherits the landed estate, in preference to 
all the other chiMren. But the United States of North 
America, has disposed of inheritances more justly, by £i 
more equal and general partition of the departed souls 
estate among his nearest relations ; so that wills here 
are not so requisite as in many other nations. 

How can a man who is dead, be said to will? All 
his mental and corporal powers, have ceased as to this 
world. He has no property ; Tie has no power ; he can 
have no will ; for he has no existence in this world ; and 
consequently, he has in this world no property. Whose, 

S 



206 

therefore, is tlie property that was in his occupation 
while he existed? To whom can it more naturally and 
rationally revert than to its most immediate source, to 
the society, the community, the nation whence his pro- 
perty was derived ? It is the commonwealth's. But 
the community has parted with her right ; and has order- 
ed, that what the man willed in his life-time, however 
partial and unjust, shall regulate the disposal of the pro- 
perty after his decease. But as the property does, of 
right, belong to the whole community, and to every man 
and woman an equal portion, is she clear of the iniquity 
of unjust and oppressive wills? She is not. Every 
child in a nation has perhaps a natural right to an equal 
proportion of all the property of every deceasing mem- 
ber of the national family : and if so, they ought, conse- 
quently, to have the legal and municipal right and privi- 
lege. Though children have a right only to so much of 
their parents property, as their services have exceeded 
the expenses of their education and bringing up , they 
have also a right to their averaged share, which is due 
from the society. 

Suppose we were a nation of seven millions of inhabi- 
tants, and that each person, (if the whole property in the 
union was equally divided,) would be entitled to a divi- 
defid worth 3000 dollars j and suppose (of the men and 
women who are adult, and hold property,) one seven- 
tieth of the whole population, or 100,000, die annually, 
these would leave a property of three hundred millions 
of dollars and more. As about 100,000 young people 
might annually arrive to the legal state of inheriting, 
each of these, mould be justly entitled, (according to this 
statement,) to about three thousand dollars, as their just 
inheritance. This portion is due to each, as a member 
of the v/hole family, of whom God should be the head, 
as he is the author and donor of every good thing we 
enjoy. 

If the principle of justice of this nature, the practice 
of every people ought to be in conformity to it. Nor^ 
is it impossible to do our duties ; or man would be ex- 
cusable, blameless, and guiltless before his maker. 
Towns might, in a corporate capacity, regulate the families 
within it : counties, superinteud the concerns of towns ; 



207 

states oversee counties, and congress examine tlif re- 
ports, and see to the order, equity, and happiness of the 
whole national family. 

That the average of wealth among families, is about 
3000 dollars as stated, appears by the estimate of Wm. 
Pitt. When England and Wale's contained 9,343,578 in- 
habiiants, or about 1,896,723 families, the property of the 
country appeared to have been valued at 1,200,000,000/. 
sterhng, which is about 632/. sterling, or 3(X)0 dol- 
lars to a famil}'. If, therefore, some families by force, 
fraud, interest, duties and rente, and inheritances, acquire 
one or two hundred times this sum, consequently one or 
two hundred families must be without a pound sterling. 
No wonder, therefore, that Martin, who conducted an 
inquiry into the state of mendicity in London, reported 
to the secretary of the realm, 15,288beggars in that city, 
beside those in alms-houses, &c. 

As but one-sixth of the families of Great Britain are 
found to be farmers, or 407,647 families, and 73 mil- 
lions of acres are said to be in the island improved or 
waste, the average of these acres among the farmers 
would be about 180 acres to each family. If some one 
has six times this amount, others must hold six times 
less than this average. Deduct more than a third for 
uncultivated and waste land, and each family will have 
less than 120 acres. They are supposed, by William 
Spence's calculation, to produce 120,000,000/. sterling 
annually ; that is about 294/. for the support, comfort, 
and prosperity of each family. 

If, therefore, any family is worth 3 or 4000 dollars, let 
him be satisfied as having his average of social property. 
For he that has more, may have more than his due, to 
the injury of another. 

CHURCH ESTABLISHMENTS BY LAW. 



The iniquitous oppression of these worldly law-estab- 
lishments are felt principally on the old continent. Jesus 
Christ declared to Pilate, that although he was a King, 
his kingdom was not of this world, else would his ser- 
vants make use of carnal weapons. Ave they, therefore, 



208 

his servants, who establish Popish churches in one coutj,» 
try, Greek churches in another, Lutheran churches in 
another, episcopalian churches in another, &c. and sup- 
port them by carnal weapons, and pecuniary exactions ? 
The Roman Catholics, since the establishment of papal 
powers, have murdered, according to the calculation of 
some, fifty millions of protestants, whom they reputed 
heretics ; and, by a moderate supposition, fifty times as- 
many, or 2,500 millions suffered various kinds of perse- 
cution in persons, and property by fines, imprisonments, 
whippings, tortures, outlawery, &c. Mede reckons up 
one million two hundred thousand Vallcnces and 
Albigenses put even to death, by this persecuting 
worldly establishment. And what is said of this church 
establishment may be said of every other one in a greaTer 
or smaller degree. 

Their pecuniary exactions and demands have been ve^- 
ry unjust; and where injustice is, there is exactly the 
same degree of oppression and slavery. The annual 
revenue of the arch- bishop of Mexico, is affirmed to be 
seventy thousand pounds ! France, before the revolution 
in 1791, contained by account 366,000 unmarried cler- 
gymen ; and an immense number of nuns in a state of ce- 
iibasy. Europe, before the protestant reformation, was 
supposed to have some millions of souls cloistered in mo- 
nasteries. When William, the conqueror of England, 
come from Normandy, he found about one-third oi the 
land of England in the hands of the clergy. According 
to the royal census in Spain, 1801, about a fifteenth part 
of the male inhabitants, between the age of 15 and 60 
years, were clergymen. Eighteen, thousand clergymen^ 
are stated by David Simpson to be in England and 
W^des in his day. The income of the church of Eng- 
land and two universities is represented to be one and a half 
millioiis of pounds sterling. Twenty-six bishops are 
said to receive 92,000 pounds annually. The bishop of 
Derry, receives _^ 15,000 annually, while rambling for 24 
years through Europe. 

Where law-establishments give to some much more 
than is due to them, it as necessarily takes as much from 
others, whose right and privilege herein is usurped and 
destroyed ; and raany of whom are suffering for fQod> 



209 

clothing, and necessaries. This is lamentable. Tythes, 
according to Brand, is the great cause of Britain's dis- 
tress. '1 hey, as well as taxes, are formed so as to be 
very oppressive to the poor, who have no jubilee now, as 
they formerly had among the Jews in the old dispension, 
when their lost possessions returned to them ; and under 
which dispensation they were to borrow money without 
increase or interest. 

These are the five approbated systems of injustice and 
cruelty, on which 1 proposed to make a few brief remarks. 
The last might have been omitted, having drawn the at- 
tention of many already. Each of them oppress the 
poorer and laborious majority of christendo^n^ (so called) 
as well as many other human inventions of cunning, ava- 
rice, and oppressive potency. 

Without adding to this list, by a wide range in civil 
and ecclesiastical state policy, let us now mentally view 
some of the consequences on that class of the community, 
who are poor and needy, born to the inheritance of pov- 
erty, and to work hard ; who are kept low, and die 
wretchedly, cut off by excessive exposures, fatigues, and 
the foul airs of unhealthy situations to which their ne- 
cessities drive them, by the sword, by pestilence, and by 
famine. If a nation suffers in any respect, the poorer 
part of it always endure the greatest distress and portion 
of it ; if famine exists, the poor only starve, the rich buy 
at any price ; if war, the poor must enlist to murder his 
fellow creature, who also enlists under the same circum- 
stances to kill those who never offended him. They are 
often obliged to enlist, or do nothing and starve, being- 
thrown out of business by the commencement of hostili- 
ties ; or if some of them have employment, and are 
drafted, they have not money to purchase their clearance, 
or pay one to go in their place. 

If pestilential fevers occur in a city, it begins and 
rages mostly among the poor, confined and crowded into 
the most impure and unhealthy places, who reside in back- 
houses where breezes can scarcely blow ; and where the 
effluvia of necessaries^ of many breaths, and of many fa- 
milies in these back-buildings, of small dimensions, and 
with small bed-rooms, smell worse in the morning to one 
from the fresh air, than any necessary house of retire- 

s 2 



#!*-& 



210 

inent. These are the people who also die for us in un- 
healthy trades, mercurial and metallic mines, suffocating 
coal-pits far under ground, and in sailing on the tempes- 
tuous seas, more for the demoralizing luxuries^ than for 
the necessities of life. Wretchedness and murder have 
purchased us almost all we enjoy in this selfish, unfeel- 
ing, and misguided world. 

All national religions, whether Pagan, Mahomedan, or 
Christian^ (so called) have been, and naturally must be 
tyrannies. Pagan Rome, According to Jerome, martyred 
or slew 1,820,000 people in the first centuries. Then 
Paganism was patronized by the authorities : as Maho- 
metanism is in Turkey ; Poper}'- in one place, Episcopacy 
in another, and so on. 

These are a few of the evils, afflictions, and deaths at- 
tributable to interests, rents, duties, and unequal inheri- 
tances. The miseries are more than I am able to depic-; 
ture. How many poor men know not what they shall 
eat, drink, or do the next day, or how soon their wives 
and children may be obliged to suffer from the husband's 
sickness, want of employ, or other calamity t His chil- 
dren's education, prosperity, and happiness, are as dear 
to him as the children of the opulent are to the rich man. 
And why, says he, must a poor, honest, and industrious 
man and his family suffer ev^ery way and in every thing, 
w^ bile the opulent overeaching drone, is blest from every 
quarter ? Has God or man ordained this ? If God, 
what kind of a God is he ? I have no hope on earth ; 
and what, Irora such a God, can I hope for hereafter t 
Thus the opulent, not only harden their own hearts by 
their iniquitous conduct, but the hearts of the poor whom 
they oppress, afflict, and murder by disease, hardships, 
and poverty ; and by war, pestilence, and famine. They, 
who afflict and murder others are afflicted and murdered 
themselves, by luxurious idleness, luxury, and excess in 
eating, drinking, clothing, sleeping, and indulgences- 
Their morals, as well as their healths, are injured by vices 
flowing from contrary sources, which frequently termi- 
oate in the same things, and bear the same fruits. Lux- 
^iry kills as well as poverty, " Gula occidit quam gla- 
:lius, sen fames." 



211 

' SECTION 2. 

SOiME EXAMPLES OF HUMAN MISERY. 

The opulent who are generous to the indigent deserve 
commendation lor doing their duty ; that is, for giving 
what is due to them, as brethren, as the sources of social 
wealth, and as sufferers. More than one fifteenth of 
mankind, in some of the countries of Europe, are obli- 
ged, according to some estimates to be supported at pub- 
lic cost ! The Italians, French, Irish and English may b€ 
mentioned as instances of this. Fletcher says, one-fif- 
teenth of the Scots are on the towns. 

Dr. James Currie, (Med. Reports chap. 20) states that 
** the population of Liverpool in 1801, was found to be 
equal to 80,759, of which 9,500 live under ground m 
cellars ; and upwards of 9000 in back houses^ which, in 
general have a very imperfect ventilation. In the new 
streets, on the south side of the town, a pernicious prac- 
tice exists of building houses, to be let to labourers, in 
small confined courts, which have a communication with 
the street by a narrow apperture, but no passage for the 
air through these openings." 

How very unhealthy and uncomfortable this must be, 
is easily imagined ; and some of the consequences are 
thus described by the Doctor. *' Among the inhabitants 
of these cellars and back houses, the typhus fever is.con- 
stantlv present. 

' " From the 1st of January, 1787 to 1797, the causes 
of fever rlone, admitted on the books of the dispensato- 
ry, appears to have been 31,243, or about 3000 annually, 
out of 13,355 — or nearly a fourth of the whole number 
received. 

" This fever arises from a want of cleanliness and ven^ 
Illation. Its influence is promoted by fatigue^ hunger^ 
daynpnesSy and sorrow. 

The Doctor declares, " that matiy of the poor in damp 
cellars do not taste animal food more than once a week.*"' 

Extend this account to all the cities of Europe, and the 
aggregate sufferings, sorrow, and destruction of the poor, 



212 

will form a dreadful picture of immense size ! The 
principal causes are interests, rents, &c. 

" All the cretins, (says Dr. Reeves, who lately visited 
Switzerland, and examined very minutely into the causes 
of cretinism J appeared in adjoining houses, situated in a 
narrow corner of the valey, and built upon ledges of 
rocks. They were all of them in very fdthy, very close, 
very hot, and miserable habitations." The cretins had 
"sickly complexions, a diminutive stature, coarse and 
prominent lips and eye-lids, wrinkled and pendulous 
jaws, loose and slabby muscles, and vacant and silly 
countenances." " In villages situated higher up the 
mountains are seen." He therefore concludes, after 
much investigation, that the production of cretinism may 
be safely and fairly attributed to the evils attendant on 
poverty, to wit : bad air and bad food, the neglect of mo- 
ral and religious education, &c." Med. Repos. Hexade 
3d vol. 1, p. 206. 

Philip Thickness in his " Useful Hints," written from 
France, 1767, says— " At the prison called Maison-de- 
force, they have apartment? wherein they confine ideots, 
and mad people. When the cells for the mad people are 
full, which is too frequently the case, the supernumeraries 
are chained in the court-yard, without any shelter ; and, 
if they survive, are exposed to all the inclemencies of 
the weather in winter and summer. Who would not 
wish to see these wretches believed. It is a national 
disgrace ; it is a disgrace to humanity." 

" In the Hotel Dieu, it is no uncommon thing to see 
four, five, and six, nay, sometimes six or eight persons in 
one bed, head and heek^ ill of different disorders, some 
dying, others actually dead." 

" It is singular, but I believe it is a fact, 1st. That 
one fifth of the children born in Paris, are sent to the 
foundling hospital : 2dly. And that one-third of the in- 
habitants in general, who die in Paris, die in an hospi- 
tal." 

" As to the tradesmen and common people in France, 
theyare worse than I suspected them to be. For?the most 
substantial will impose where they can, and the petit 
•monde are in general down right cheats. Perhaps their 
extreme poverty is the occasion ' of the latter's knavery 



213 

with them.' Dirt, ignorance, and'boldness, without any 
sense of shame, universally prevail.'' 

In the country, as " The revenues are farmed out to 
individuals who are thereby empowered to oppress the 
the industrious poor in every manner they can contrive, 
many of the poor, who wish to keep a cow, durst not do 
it, for fear of being thought rich, and consequently taxed 
higher." 

Such instances of wretchedness, among all warlike na- 
tions bearing the name of civilized, show a radical de- 
fect of virtue, and a potent principle of vice, which like 
the great tree, seen by Nebuchadnezzar, covers the whole 
earth with baleful fruits and branches. And vices in the 
great, beget iniquities in the poor. 

The oppressive and premature labour of the youth of 
Great Britain, in some manufactories, produce lamenta- 
ble consequences to these innocent young creatures, 
whose health and morals are corrupted and injured, if 
not ruined. In proof of this Dr. Aitkin writes thus.— - 
" The invention and improvement of machines to shor- 
ten labour, have had a surprising influence to extend our 
trade, and call children for our cotton mills. In these 
(at Manchester) children of very tender age, are em- 
ployed ; many of them are collected from the work- 
houses in London and Westminter, and transported in 
crouds, as apprentices to masters resident many hundred 
miles'dlstant, where they serve, unknown, unprotected^ 
and forgotten by those to whose care nature and the laws 
had consigned them. These poor children are usually 
confined too long to work in close rooms ; and often du- 
ring the whole night. The air they breathe is injurious, 
and but little attention is paid to their cleanliness. Fre- 
quent changes from a warm, and then to a cold and dense 
atmosphere, are predisposing causes to epidemic fevers 
and sickness. They are not generally strong to labour, 
or capable of pursuing any other branch of business, 
when the term of their apprenticeship expires. The fe- 
males are v/holly uninstructed in sewing, knitting, and 
other domestic affairs requisite to make them notable and 
frugal housewives and mothers. The want of early re- 
ligious instruction and example, and the numerous and 
indiscriminate associations in these buildings, are very 
unfavorable to their conduct in life." 



f2l4 

It was stated in 1801, that 2,136,726 persons Were 
employed in Great Britain in the manufactories, in trade 
and in handicraft-work : and many children's morals, 
healths, and constitutions are ruined in the manufacto- 
ries. 

Though the benevolence of some pious and humane 
people in London do much by way of alms and elemosy- 
nary institutions, yet many times as much ought to be 
performed to relieve all the poor and needy. At an ex- 
hibhion of charity children in St, Paul's Church, so cal- 
led, A. D. 1815, it is said a number of 8,000, between 
7 and 14 ye>ars of age assembled; none of whom be- 
longed to the numberless private institutions of benevo- 
lence. It appears, from official authority, that more than 
40,000 are instructed by the national society : may the 
spirit of love be extended. 

Silk-mills, introduced into England 1734, are very op- 
pressive, and injure the children of the poor more than 
cotton mills. Their bodies and limbs are distorted by 
their premature and forced labours at such machines. 
Ten such mills were worked, A. D 1774, in the single 
town of Derby, and produced in the labourers of them 
the most abject poverty, dependance, and deformity. 
And Dr. Darvin atsserts in his Loonomia, that hun- 
dreds of the children of that town were starved into the 
scrophula, by reason of their unwholesome food, and ei- 
ther perished by that miserable and coroding dise"hse, or 
lived in a wretched state of debility. When one consi- 
ders the great opulence and indigence of the members of 
society, to be produced essentially, and almost wholly by 
interests, rents, tythes, duties, taxes, and inheritances, 
how wretched is he made by such views of the miseries 
of his fellow creatures, and brethren in the flesh ! Indi- 
vidual histories of such wretchedness exist every where, 
the narrative of whose sufferings are afflicting beyond 
description, and sufficient to soften the stoutest hearts, 
and most tyrannical dispositions. 

By Bell's Weekly Mtssenger, of March 10, 1816, it 
appears that the burden on the farmers for rents and 
poor rates are so intolerable, that all the farmers but one, 
in a parish of Huntingdonshire, had thrown up their 
farms. The poor rates on a hundred pounds rent is 



215 

about 50/. If a farmer pays 150/. annually for fent, he 
pays 70/. for the support of the poor of the parish. Ciir- 
wcn says the poor rates are at least 7 millions annually. 
In Ireland poor rates are not thus collected by tax, and 
the consirquence is horrible ! the poor perish by cold, 
hunger, and want of necessaries. 

Western, a member of parliament, speaking on the 
taxes declared, *^ that whole parishes in Cambridgeshire, 
were now left as wild and desolate as any of the British 
colonies." And no wonder, when the labouring and pro- 
ductive class of the community, (so called) pay to the 
fund-holders and sinking fund 44 millions pounds ster- 
ling, or 206,460,000 dollars, and ab«ut 16 millions 
pounds to the support of government, or more than 71 
millions of dollars. Thompson truly and feeliiigly 
might exclaim — 

How many drink the cup 
Of baleful grief 1 or eat the biter br%ad 
Of misery. Sore, pierced by wintry winds, 
How many shrink into the sordid hut, 
Of cheerless poverty !'* 

And when we read in an ofRcial letter laid before the 
house of Parliament, of an item of 6000/. or 26,640 dol- 
lars, for the queen of Englands' riding for pleasure from 
London, 56 miles to Brighton, and which sum, (more 
than our president's salary) was paid to her out of the 
treasury — may we not add : 

*' Ah ! little think the gay, licentious proud. 
Whom pleasure, power, and affluence surround ; 
They, who their thoughtless hours in giddy mirth. 
And wanton oft in cruel riot waste : 
Ah ! little think they while they dance along 
How many feel, this very moment, deaths 
And all the sad variety of pain.'* 

" A great woman's wealth is her strong city," while 
" the destruction of the poor is their poverty." " I con- 
sidered," said the wise man, " all the oppressions that 
are done under the sun ; and beheld the tears of such as 



216 

were oppressed, and they had no comforter.'^ " On 
the side also, of their oppressors, was power, but they 
had no comforter !" Not only power, but law and cus- 
tom have been on their "^ide from the days of Nimrod, 
the mighty hunter of men and tyrant of Assyria, to the 
present days of Bonaparte, a greater than Nimrod. Let 
the Assyrians and French, not Ninus nor Napoleon, be 
principally criminated for the vices their nations loved. 
The wicked world framed mischiefs by their laws ; and 
rejoice in their conduct. Who shall convince them of 
the folly of national iniquity ? Nations, old in wicked- 
ness, will not be changed to holiness or virtue. 

I conceive that the root of all national vices is selfish- 
ness; which, operating in conquerors and governors, have 
induced thtm to make potency the criterion of equity ; 
and war and revenue the foundations of their thrones. 
The great ones are cemented to their monarchs andlead* 
ers, by their incomes, rents, interests, banks, or other con- 
trivances and in'^entions, to deceive and oppress the lit- 
tle ones of the nation. 

It has been observed that the majority of clerks in the 
city of London, are obliged, from sheer oppression, to be 
batcfielors. And^^ccording to Colquhoun about 20,000 
miserable individuals of various classes and characters, 
rise every morning, without knowing how, or by what 
means they are to be supported during the day, or where, 
in many cases, they can lodge the succeeding night. It 
is also calculated, that one-third of the population of 
England, Scotland, and Ireland are paupers^ who are 
broken down with labour and hardships, wretched and 
pitiable. A writer says, *' That poverty and irresistible 
necessity to labour every day, dictates submission to the 
rich. That this irresistible necessity to labour ; this 
long established and all pervading aristocracy of insolent 
wealth and rapacity over merit in poverty, has made 
slaves, beggars, or dependants of one-halt of the people 
of England, by grinding the multitudes subordinately en- 
gaged in its astonishing manufactories, and extensive 
com nerce, i)etween them, as between two mill-stones, 
F(.>»- whether the aristocracies consist of the proud knee- 
dhtortzjiq- master-cw^/^r of Sheffield ; of the proud child^ 
starving" vadi^ttY'Stlk-throwers of Derby, Nottingham^ 



217 

licicester, Coiigleton, &c. ; or the more proud and po- 
tent first rate merclimUs of the city of London ; their 
moral and physical effects on the human character in 
producing slavery, poverty, and degradation on the one 
hand, and tyranny, opulence and brutality on the other, 
are precisely the same." 

Thus I have endeavoured to seek out and exemplify "the 
chiel causes of the wicked oppressions of men ; and they 
are resolvable into a selfish love and indulgence of pow- 
er, wealth, and pleasure, acquired and supported by the 
sword and the law of interests, rents, unequal duties, 
taxes, and inheritances. May this testimony advance, 
and the Prince of Peace and Righteousness establish his 
mountain of love o\ier all nations. 



SECTION 3. 

SUCH THINGS ARE UNSCRIPTURAL AND 
IMPIOUS. 

Since all these accumulated evils arise from injustice, 
from the oppression of the poor, and incomes of the opu- 
lent, or from interests, rents, duties, and unjust laws and 
customs, framed by the avaricious and ambitious, there- 
fore it may be said. Psalm 10 : " Why standest thou afar 
off, O Lord, why hidest thou thyself in times of trouble ? 
The wicked in his pride doth persecute the poor, and 
blesseth the covetous, whom the Lord abhorreth. He 
lieth in wait in secret places, as a lion in his den ; he 
lieth in wait to catch the poor. He doth catch the poor, 
whom he draweth in his net. He croucheth and hum- 
bleth himself, that the poor may fall by his strong ones. 
He hath said in his heart, God hath forgotten ; he hideth 
his face ; he will never see it. Arise, O Lord, lift up 
thy hand : break thou the arm of the wicked and evil- 
man, seek out his wickedness till thou send none." 

I really think, since God works by his saints and ser- 
vants, that it is the duty of many of them to investigate 
the causes of the afflictions and sufferings of the poor and 
needy. It is the interest and duty of the rich and exalt- 
ed to do it ; for they suffer, and perhaps as greatly as 

T 



218 

those, whose labour and want enriches them. *' Their 
sword, as says king David, Psalm 37, 14, [which pierces 
the poor] shall enter into their own heart." Besides, says 
he, (Psalm 41) " Blessed is he that considereth the poor; 
the Lord will deliver him in time of trouble : the Lord 
will make his bed in sickness, &c." 

Agur's prayer was very judicious ; he was sensible 
that riches, as well as poverty, were very pernicious. 
Give me, said he, neither richea nor poverty ; lest, be- 
ing rich, proud, and full, I belie thee impiously, and say 
" who is the Lord," and so become atheistical : or lest 
being poor, I should steal, and lie, and then swear to it, 
taking the name of my God in vain. 

Let the rich reflect that " wise men die, likewise the 
fool and brutish person perish, and leave their wealth to 
others; that their inward thought is, that their houses 
[and demesnes] shall continue for ever [in their lineal de- 
scendants] ; and tiheir dwelling places to all generations. 
They call their lahds after their own name." But the 
inspired Psalmist adds — ^' This their way is their fol- 
ly." See also Jeremiah, 17, 11. 

The kingdoms of this world are not the kingdoms of 
our lord and his Christ, or the poor and fatherless ; the 
afflicted and needy would be delivered out of the oppres- 
sive hand of the rich and powerful, and justice done to 
all, poor and wealthy, weak and potent, without respect 
persons. At present, the powerful oppress the imbecile ; 
and the cunning cheat the honest, and simple ; therefore, 
no wonder if the common folks cheat, steal, and counter- 
feit money. It may be said, in the words of David, Psalm 
82 : " All the foundations (political foundations) of the 
earth are out of course." They stand not on the sure 
foundation, the tried corner stone, refused by all the po- 
litical builders of governments. And by refusing and 
rejecting this, (the sure and right foundation,) they are 
all out of course, and are wicked, oppressive, unjust, and 
anti-christian. Alas ! they know not, neither will they un- 
derstand, unless more pains be taken to inform them, by 
the friends of God, and of an oppressed world. They 
believe not practically, that '*^he who oppresses the poor, 
reproaches his maker : but he who has mercy on them, 
honoureth the Lord^" that they who stop their ears at 



219 

the cry of the poor, shall cry themselves [perkaps in 
everlasting wretchedness] tuid not be heard by the crea- 
tor ; a^id that he who oppresses the poor to increase his 
riches, shall surely come to want ; to a worse want and 
poverty, than ihat which can exist in this world. They ' 
know that '^thc rich ruleth over the poor:" they love 
this pov/er over theni, and reflect not on the wicked mo- 
tive that fascinates them to rule out of the love of God 
and of his human family. They do not consider that 
"as roaring lions and raging bears, so are wicked rulers 
over the poor people." 

Hence their family possessions and national dominions 
have passed away, and changed masters, from age to 
age, and from generation to generation, " The king that 
faithfully judgeth the poor, (is Christ,) his throne shall be 
estai)lished for ever." "^ Rob not the poor, because he is 
poor; neither oppress the afflicted in the gate [of judica- 
ture] ; for the Ijord will plead their cause, and spoil the 
SOUL that spoiled them." And he will give the riches 
of them, " who by usury or by interest has increased 
their substance, to those who will pity the poor," agree- 
able to Prov. 28, 8, (Isa. 10, 1, Jer. 22, 13.) The sins 
of Sodom are among us ; even '•^ pride ^ fullness of breads 
and abundance of idleness^"* in the wealthy, who strength- 
ens not the hand of the poor and needy ; but " swallow 
them up" in their luxuries, &c. as the great fish eat up 
the small ones. " As the proud hate humility, so doth 
the rich abhor the poor." " The wicked in his pride 
doth persecute the poor;" when "they decree unright- 
eous decrees," and "establish iniquity by the law;" when 
they build their houses by unrighteousness, and their 
chambers by wrong;" when they use their neighbour's 
service without sufficient wages ; when they " keep back 
their hire ;" or when they make them pay more, in pro- 
portion to their property, than the opulent, in duties, 
taxes, navys, national services, and receive less than their 
armies, navys, manufactories, &c. as soldiers, sailors, and 
workmen. 

Things would not have been thus, if man had not fal- 
len out of God ; and these things will not be so when the 
kingdoms of the world become the kingdoms of Christ, 
In the commencement of the coming of the kingdom of 



220 . 

Heaven upon eanh, when God's will began among the 
first christians to be done on earth as it is in Heaven^ 
" all ihe believers were so united together in love^ that 
they had all things common ; and sold their possessions 
»nd goods, and distributed them to all, as every man had 
need." Mhie and thine^ ceased to be used among them. 
Qui\ or the Lord^s property was now used. Every one 
sought not his own, but neighbour's good, and the bene- 
fit of the whole. To vary from this principle of benevo- 
lence was an av/ful crime, if we might judge the great- 
ness of crimes by the awfulness of the punishment. 
Ananius and Saphira were struck dead for lying, and 
keeping back part of the price ©f their property from the 
common stock. Self^ in these two, was not wholly denied, 
nor the cross wholly taken up, nor Jesus only followed, 
or they would not have so loved their money, as to have 
coveted part of the price, and lied against the Holy Spi- 
rit that had moved them to put their wealth into a com- 
mon stock. What an apostacy has succeeded this fore- 
taste, of the milenial kingdoms of Christ upon earth! 
when wars shall wholly subside, and oppression cease. 

But wo ! to the rich, before these days come. For 
thus James, the apostle, wrote : " weep and howl ye rich 
men for your miseries that shall come upon you. Ye 
have heaped up treasure for the last days. Behold, the 
hire of the labourers, who have reaped down your fields, 
which you kept back by fraud, crieth : and the cries of 
them which have reaped, have entered into the ears of the 
T,ordofSabboath," 



CONCLUDING APPENDICE TO THE «' PLEAr 
tSURES OF CONTEiMPLATION.-' 



THE forgoing remarks on the causes of " Popular 
Poverty," are certainly worthy the investigation of the first 
men in the United States, not excluding the President. 
And I do sincerely hope he will attend to my arguments 
in favour ot amending our present mode of scholastic edu- 
cation, as also to encourage the organization of national 
and state seminaries, as recommended in the 4th edition 
of my '' Charms of Benevolence," p. 94. When 1 remem- 
ber the contrast between Mr. Monroe and the aggregate 
rulers of Europe, I cannot help recollecting the superb 
Roman Emperors, and the simple Cincinnatus. Our in- 
telligent President will ride on his horse for miles with- 
out even a servant. What a noble pattern for his subor- 
dinate officers, who are too often slaves to what Pope 
calls " Pride, the never-failing vice of fools." Yet where, 
among the legitimates, will we find a man of his eminent 
abilities, one capable of composing even such a state pa- 
[xir as this gentleman composed the late war, for the pur- 
pose of organizing and arming the American militia, 
with a just equilibrium in defence of the Republic f The 
fact is, were all the legitimates collected in one group, 
they would not be equal to such a task. Indeed I 
know not one of them worthy of being compared to 
our present President, unless it is Alexander of Russia, 
whose urbanity is proverbial. 1 have read with much 
interest pieces in the Aurora, wrote with the view of cor- 
recting the present mode of civilization ; but the author, 
whose name is Mr. Owen, though deserving a statue of 
gold for his excellent and benevolent remarks, little 
thought how futile it was to attempt to prevail upon those 
who live in elegant idleness upon the corruptions of so- 
ciety, freely to forego their ill-gotten prey. There is rio 
city in United States I feel a more ardent desire that mv 
arguments may be beneficial to, than Baltimore. W^heii 
I remember General Washington, the father of his 
country, (oh that Bonaparte had imitater, him) and be- 
iiold his rising monument in Howard's woods, I cannot 



222 

Jtelp venerating the grateful Baltimoreans. When I con- 
trast the retreat of Bladensburg with the battle of North 
Point, I cannot help admiring the brave Baltimoreans. 
Finally, when I experience their patronage and liberality, 
which I have more than in any other part of the United 
States, I cannoc help expressing my grateful acknow- 
ledgements to the benevolent Baltimoreans, the pride and 
honour of the American Republic^ the only one the rava- 
ges of monarchy and episcopacy has left in the whole 
world. No crime do I so much detest as bigotry, or' 
want of liberality, whether in a nation, a city, or an indi- 
vidual : and no ctime is more unreasonable and inexcus- 
able in the sight of God. For instance, suppose seven chil- 
dren, the offspring of one of our most enlightened fellow 
citizens, were sent, while infants, to the following per- 
sonages for tuition : the 1st, to the priests of the Grand 
Lama; the 2d, to the priests ©f Juggernott ; the 3d, to 
the priests of Mahomet ; the 4th, to the Calvinists ; the 
5th, to the Armenians ; the 6th, to the President of a cer- 
tain college, in a certain city in the United States, which 
delicacy forbids me to mention ; and the 7th, to Daniel 
Reese, the patriotic and intelligent principal of a large and 
popular seminary in Old Town, Baltimore. When these 
children become men, with their characters formed accord- 
ing to the passions and prejudices ofthcir preceptors, (which 
would be most assuredly the case) would it not be very 
■wicked and ungenerous for them to dislike and despise 
each other because they totally and unavoidably differed 
in sentiment. And if we see the young collegian prate 
and pray, and preach and write in support of aristocracy, 
and sell his country the first opportunity to a royal 
knave ! is it any wonder? is he not to be pitied ? and are 
not those to blame who suffer such tory pedigogues to 
corrupt our youth, when it is in their power to put a stop 
to this growing evil, which is silently and slyly devour- 
ing the vitals of the body politic ? But is it not unjust 
and cruel for our rulers supinely to !)ehold our youth cor- 
rupted by a fatal and faulty education, and then forsooth 
punish them for bringing forth the fruit thereof, when 
it was in their power to remove the cause, and then the 
effects would cease ? We see the force of early habits in 
the valour exhibited by the brave young Baltimorean, 



22S 

(whom I would contrast with the above young tory) 
who sacrificed his lile in dcltnce of his native city the late 
war, while the same moment other young Americans in 

the state of , were planing how they might sell their 

country to the royal foe. As I expect Howard's woods 
will, in following jears, be the centre of Baltimore, I 
would beg leave to suggest whether it would i:ot be judi- 
cious to have small pyrimidical monuments erected in 
memory of the heroes who died in defence of their city 
the late war, as well as the heroes ot the revolution, sur- 
rounding the magnificent monument of their commander 
iq chief, adorned with patriotic inscriptions and emble- 
matical sculpture, and embowered with weeping willows, 
cvpress, he. About 7 years ago I published the follow- 
ing piece,* with the view ol stimulating the citizens of 
Philadelphia, to erect a monument to General Wash- 
ington, with patriotic inscriptions, to remind our young 
citizens of the intrinsic value of civil liberty. But it 
proved abortive. The poem commences thus : 

" Awake, my muse, the sad Columbian strain ; 
Oh ! sing the triumph and the deathless fame 
Of Washington ! the servant of his God, 
The friend of man, his country's chiefest good. 
For us he fought, he conquered and he died ; 
*' And e'en his failings, lean'd to virtue's side." 
Long toils for us republicans he bore. 
But now he's dead, his virtues charm no more* 
For all his perils, his fraternal pains, 
What boon's return'd by us ? what fruit remains I 
Hardships, and toils, and pain for us he brav'd, 
Our fathers, wives, and weeping infants sav'd ; 
Sav'd from the hands of royal villainy. 
And yet our base returns those villains see. 
A Macedonian king more love displayed, 
And built a statue to his horse's shade ! 
*' Republican ingratitude " has gave 
No such memorial to adorn his grave ; 
Yet though no lofty monument or bust 
Adorns the sod that hides his sacred dust, 
Though his own countrymen no trophy gave, 

• The apothesis of Gen. George WashiBgton. 



224 

Save a cheap tear, to decorate his grave, 
The plaintive muse will a memorial give. 
And bid his name revive — his virtues live. 

^ ^ W TT TV" '/"? *V Vf 

If we really believe civil liberty to be a great blessing, 
surely we should use every lawful means to transmit it to 
our posteriij'as a most sacred deposit, not regarding the 
hypocritical sneers of sanctimonious devotees. And all 
errors in the present education of our youth, which may 
prove fatal thereto, should be Carefully exterminated, I 
hope Mr. Monroe will seriously consider the importance 
of this notification. He has now the power of doing much 
good ; may he use it with wisdom and beneficence ; he 
well knows that 

" Reading and writing are merely instrumertts by which 
knowledge, either true or false, may be imparted ; and 
when given to children are of little comparative value, 
unless they shall be also taught how to comprehend what 
is presented to their understanding, and to make a pro- 
per use of them. 

" When a child receives a full and fair explanation of 
the objects and characters around him, and when he is 
also taught to reason correctly, so that he may learn to 
discover particular or general truths, and to discriminate 
between truth and falsehood ; he will be much better in- 
structed, although without the knowledge of one letter 
or figure, than those who are compelled to believe 
what it is impossible for them to comprehend, and v/hose 
reasoning faculties have been confounded or destroyed, 
by the violent distortion of reasoning, to purposes which 
reason can never reachj and which is most erroneous- 
ly termed learning. 

" It is readily acknowledged, however, that the manner 
of instructing children is of importance, and deserves all 
the attention which it has lately received, and that those 
who discover or introduce improvements which facilitate 
the acquirement of knowledge, are important benefactors 
to their fellow creatures. 

*' Yet the manner of giving instruction is one thing, the 
instruction itself another, and no two objects can be more 
distinct. The worst manner may be applied to give the 
^«^ instruction. Were the real importance of both to be 



225 

estimatedtby numbers, the manner of instruction may be 
computed as one^ and the matter of instruction to mil- 
lions ; the first may be considered only as the means^ the 
last, the end 10 be accomplished by those means. 

** If therefore, in a national system of education for the 
poor, it be desirable to adopt the btst majmcr^ it is surely 
so much the more desirable to adopt also the best matter 
of instruction. 

" Either give the poor a rational and useful learning, or 
mock not their ignorance, their poverty, and their misery, 
by merely instructing them to become conscious of the 
extent of the^degradation under which they exist. And, 
therefore, in pity to suffering humanity, either keep the 
poor, if you nozv can^ in the state of the most abject ig- 
norance, like the Africans in the West Indies, as near as 
possible to brute animal life, or at once determine to 
form them into ratioHal beings, into useful and effectual 
members of the state. 

" Were it possible without national prejudice, to exam- 
ine into the matter of instruction which is now given ia 
some of our boasted new systems of instruction for the 
poor, it would be found as wretched and stupifying as 
any thing that could be purposely devised to confound the 
understanding and frustrate every effort of the intellect 
to exercise its power like a rational creature. In proof 
of this statement enter any one of the schools denomina- 
ted national, and request the teacher to shew any of the 
acquirements of the children; and what is the kind of 
exercise they are called upon to exhibit. Is it what their 
faculties are best adapted to acquire or to comprehend ? 
Is it any thing, which in their future course of life, can 
contribute to their support, to foster their industry, or 
inform their understandings ? Unhappy disciples of blind 
authority, of systematized ignorance, fanaticism, and in- 
fatuation ! The teacher questipns children in matters of 
theology, on subjects upon which the most profound eru- 
dition cannot make a rational reply ; upon which every 
day opinions are dividing, and sects splitting to more nu- 
merous and extravagant systems, which at every new di- 
vergency appears to take a bound more remote from the 
primitive simplicity and natural humility which the most 
sublime of all subjects should inspire: yet the teachcv 



226 

proceeds as gravely with his interrogatories, as if the 
mere repetition of words was the comprehension of ideas 
or of facts ; the children too, answer, they answer readily 
in the very words that they have' been previously exer- 
cised; and no parent can,, it must be confessed, answer 
with more exactness, though it is also equally true that 
the parent and the child equally understand, and are 
equally competent to explain the lessons which they have 
been exercised in ; this surely cannot be called ecluca- 
tioDj it is a most crying mockery — and this mockery of 
learning is all that is required. 

"Thus the child whose natural faculty for comparing 
ideas, or whose rational powers shall be soonest destroy- 
ed, if at the same time he possesses a memory to retain 
incongruities without connection, will become what is 
termed the first scholar in the class; and three- fourths 
of the time which ought to be devoted to the acquire- 
ment of useful instruction, is really occupied in destroy- 
ing the mental powers of those unfortunate children. 

" To those who are accustomed attentively to notice the 
human countenance, from infancy to age, in the various 
classes and religious denominations of the British popu- 
lation, it is truly an instructive, although a peculiarly me- 
lancholy employment, to observe in the countenances of 
the poor children, in these schools, the evident expression 
of mental injury derived from the well intentioned, but 
most mistaken plan of their instruction. 

" It is an important lesson, because it affords another 
apd a recent and striking example, in addition to trie 
millions of others, which all history and experience re- 
cord, of the ease with which children may be taught to 
receive any notions^ and thence acquire any habits, how- 
ever contrary to their real happiness. Great abhorrence 
isexcited by the late narratives of the rites and ceremo- 
nies performed at Juggernott, in India ; but arc not the 
unfortunate people who partake in that worship taught, 
that those rites and cere.r»onies are not only proper but 
laudable. Were they not, when their minds were first 
opening, instructed in this idolatry, and can they be 
blamed who being so taught, and subjected to reproach, 
or punishment, or persecution through life ; or to banish- 
ment from society, apd without any chance of being re- 



227 

ccrivcu inlo liny other societ)^ if they should deny or dare 
to utt^i any other opinions than those which they have 
been taught — can they be blamed or hated, when under 
such a tenible and intolerant system, they do not enter- 
tain opinions cone urring with other men and other na- 
tions taught differently from them. They are objects 
indeed of pity and commisseration — but a little dispas- 
sionate consideration would teach us to say also that cha- 
rity should heg'ni at home ; for with all our boasted intel- 
lectual light, we are only a little less in the dark than the 
worshippers of Juggernott. 

" To those trained to become truly conscientious in 
any of the diverse and innumerable opposite opinions 
which distract the world, this free exposure of the weak- 
ness and inconsistency in which such individuals have 
been instructed, may at first create feelings of dissatisfac- 
tion or displeasure, probably in some extremely fanatical 
sensations of horror ; and these senations will be acute 
and poignant, possibly violent even to wrath, sufficient to _ 
kindle flames and construct racks ; this will be propor- 
tioned too, to the obvious and irresistible evidence, on the 
disclosure of those errors is founded. But it is at the 
same time satisfactory and consoling to know, that this 
intense subjection to the tyranny of forced opinion, and 
the cruel application of the education of the poor to the 
support of a particular sect, so as to become hostile to 
every other sect, has produced a lively feeling of appre- 
hension, and produced a spirit of inquiry, which though 
arising out of the prejudices of sects, or the spirit of sec- 
tarian-opinion, has as is usual in all inquiries once boldly 
and honestly undertaken, resulted in the devclopementof 
truths and judgments which promise to produce the best 
effects on society at large, and to promote a more correct 
and general impression as to the established modes of 
education, and the errors which have prevailed as to the 
dominancy of partial instruction in forming the early opi- 
nions and habits. 

" If men will think calmly on those subjects ; if they 
will re-examine their own minds, and the minds of all 
around them, they will soon become conscious of the ab- 
surdities and inconsistencies in which their forefathers 
have trained them ', they will then abhor the errors by 
which they have been so long abused, and with an ear- 



nestness not to be resisted, they will exert their utmost 
faculties to remove the cause of so much misery to man. 

" No one, it may be supposed, can now be so defec- 
tive in knowledge as to imagine, that it is a different hu- 
man nature, which, by its own power, forms itself into a 
child of ignorance, of poverty, and of habits leading to 
crime and to punishment ; or into a votary of faction, 
claiming distinction from its folly and inconsistency ; or 
to fancy that it is some undefined, blind, unconscious 
process of human nature itself, distinct from instruction 
that forms the sentiments and habits of men of commerce, 
of agriculture, of law, of the men of the church, army, 
and navy, or of the private and illegal depredator on 
society ; or that it is a different human nature which 
constitutes the societies of Jews, of Friends, and all the 
various religious denominations which have existed or 
which now exist. 

" No ! human nature, save the minute differences 
which are ever found in all compounds of the creation, is 
one and the same in all ; it is v/ithout exception univer- 
sally plastic, and by judicious trainings the infants of any 
class in the world may be readily formed into men of any 
other class ; even to believe and declare that conduct to 
be right and virtuous, and to die in its defence, which 
their parents had been taught to believe and say was 
wrong and vicious, and to oppose which those parents 
would also have willingly sacrificed their lives. 

*' Whence then the foundation of your claims, ye advo- 
cates of superiority of the early prepossessions of your 
sect or party, in opposition to those taught to other men ? 
Ignorance itself at this day might almost make it evident 
that one particle of merit is not due to you for not pos- 
sessing those notions and habits which you now the most 
contemn, any more than you may claim merit for speak- 
ing the language to which you have been accustomed ; 
and you might, with the same justice, condemn them to 
worldly reproach and eternal torments for not speaking 
the same language you do, as for entertaining ideas, or 
opinions, or notions different from yours. Ought you 
not, then, and will you not have charity for' those who 
have been taught a different language or different senti- 
ments and habits from yourselves ? Let all men fairly 
investigate this subject for themselves ; it well merits 



their most utttutive examination ; they will then disco- 
ver that it is tVom the errors ot" corruption, misinstruct- 
ing the young mind, relative to the true cause of early 
prepossessions, that almost all the evils oflife proceed. 

** Whence, then, ye advocates tor the merit and deme- 
rit of early impressions of opinion, do you derive your 
principles I How many of you have ever dared to think 
freely ? How many of you have ever examined your- 
selves, and sought to know the foundation of your pre- 
tensions to disparage or to hate your fellow men, merely 
for being born in some other society, or taught by other 
teachers, or believing diiferently from what you be- 
lieve ? 

*' Let this system of misery be seen in all its deformi- 
ty ! It ought to be exposed ; for the instruction which 
it inculcates at the outset of forming human character, is 
destructive of that genuine charity, which can alone 
train man to be truly benevolent to all other men. Th^ 
ideas of exclusive right in opinions, which are indepen- 
dent of physical evidence, that consequent superiority 
which men have hitherto been taught to attach to the 
early sentiments and habits in which they have been in- 
structed, and in which, although there tre ten thousand 
different classes, each disagreeing from every other, eve- 
ry one class assumes to itself the exclusive superiority in 
itself, and a general superiority, or worse in several de- 
grees over all the others ; these are the chief causes of 
disunion, hatred, envy, and unchariiableness throughout 
society ; this is the true revolt of fallen angels against the 
God who has given man this earth to be to him a heaven, 
but which this baleful system converts into a place of sin 
and torment, and weeping, and wailing, and misery.— 
Such a system — such notions are in direct opposition to 
pure and undefiled religion, nor can they ever exist to- 
gether ; while one exists man will continue to be misera- 
ble, to the great portion of the human race this earth must 
be a pandemonium Remove this afflicting system, men 
will then not hate each other, and this earth will become 
a paradise — a fit place of preparation for an immortality 
worthy of the Creator of all things. 

" The extent of the misery which is generated by the 
prevailing system, cannot however be very long conceal- 



^30 

ed ; the eyes of mankind are already cleansed from the 
dark film which obscured their mental vision ; and im^ 
position of every kind is hastening fast to the same grave 
in which so many errors have been buried during the last 
four centuries ; every age may seem to be only a step, but 
the steps mast becoQie strides, and augment their pace oil 
every succession like the law of gravitation ; this gross 
system of ignorance on which the system of mise;*y has 
been raised, is unveiled ; it stands exposed to the world 
on its proper foundation ; and so exposed, its supporters 
must shrink from the task of vindicating the misery of 
man, as necessary to the glory of a benificent and ineffa- 
ble God; the weapons of terror no longer appear formi- 
dable, and although the followers of those who suffered 
and whose suffering overthrew the pile and the torture, 
and cast broad open the dungeons of a devilish system, 
have travelled into the same path and restored to the 
enginery of fear, without hope and pains, without limita- 
tion of time ; each has become still less wicked; though 
there are who would still renew all that was most fell 
and afflicting, to maintain their worldly power ai)d 
their worldly avarice ; but no rational mind will now be 
found to give such a system support ; and the most har- 
dened and cruel are forced to relent or to dissemble and 
affect, if they do not feel goodness, and charity, and love 
pf all men. 

" Having exhibited the errors on \vhich ignorance has 
erected the systems by which man has been governed, or 
compelled to become irrational and miserable ; and hav- 
ing laid an immoveable foundation for a system devoid 
of that error, and which, clearly comprehended, and 
adopted in practice, must train mankind to think and act 
towards others, as they would wish others to think and 
act towards them : we proceed further to explain this 
system without error, and which may be termed a S3^s- 
tem without mystery. 

'' As then children coUectively'may be formed into any 
characters, by whom ought their characters to be form- 
ed ? 

** The kind and degree of misery or happiness experi- 
enced by the members of any community, depend on the 
(characters which have been formed in the individuals 



1 



which compose the community. It becomes then tlie 
highest interest, and conseqiieiuly the fust and most im- 
portant duty of every state, to form the individual cha- 
racters of which the state is composed. And if any cha- 
racters, from the most ignorant and miserable, to the 
most rational and happy, can be formed, it surely merits 
the deepest attention of every state to adopt those obvi- 
ous means by which the formation of the latter mriv be 
secured, and that of the lormer prevented. 

" It follows, th'.it every state, in order to be well govern- 
ed, ought to direct its chitif attention to the formation of 
character; and that the best governed state will be that 
which sh'^ll po-ss( ss the bestnational system of education. 

" And, under the guidancft of minds competent to its di- 
rection, a national system of training and education may 
be formed, to become the most safe, easy, effectual, and 
economical instrument of government that can be devis- 
ed. And it may be made to possess a power equal to 
the accomplishment of the most grand and beneficial pur- 
poses. 

" It is, however, by instruction only, that the population 
of the worl'd can be made conscious of the irrational state 
in which they now exist, and until that instruction is giv- 
en, it is premature to introduce a national system of edu- 
cation, although it will be the duty of every community, 
great or small, to adopt and pursue such means as may 
prepare the minds of men for the adoption, by continual- 
ly pressing upon the minds of persons of all ages, and 
particularly the young of both sexes, the comfort derived 
from promoting the good of others. 

" But to whom can such arrangements be submitted ? 
Who is he that is so much above the passions of the 
world as to be a fit judge ? Melancholy indeed is the 
reflection ! But it must not be spoken to — the prejudi- 
ces — ihe conspiring bodies of men, who, while they arc 
taught to hate each other — are also organized to keep 
mankind elapsed under mental and moral subjection — 
degraded by being taught to shut their eyes against the 
light of reason, and grope through darkness with their 
eyes open — they must be spoken to — they must be con- 
fronted by truth ; the system that every where bears 
down man in degradation must bs exposed— it must be 



judged, but shall the commercial character be the judge, 
in whose estimation to forsake the path of immediate in- 
dividual gain, would be to shew symptoms of a disorder- 
ed imagination ? For the children of commerce have 
been trained to direct all their faculties to buy cheap and 
sell dear; and consequently, those who are the most ex- 
pert and successful in this wise and noble art, are, in the 
commercial world, deemed to possess foresight and su- 
perior acquirements, while such as attempt to improve 
the natural habits, and increase the comforts of those 
whom they employ, are termed wild enthusiasts. 

"Nor yet are they to be submitted to rhe mere men of 
law ; for they are necessarily trained to endeavour to 
make v/rong appear right, or involve both in a train of in- 
tricacies, and to legalize injustice. 

" Nor are the mere leaders of political parties, or their 
partizans, for they are embarrassed by the trammels of 
party, which mislead the judgment, and often constrain 
tliem to sacrifice the real well-being of the community and 
of themselves to an apparent, but mos* mistaken sdf- 
interest. 

*'Kor to those who are termed heroes and conquerors, 

or their followers ; for inch' minds have been trained ta 
consider the infliction of human misery and the commis- 
sion of military murders a glorious duty, and almost be- 
yond reward. 

" Nor yet the fashionable or splendid in the eyes of the 
v/orld ; for these are from their infancy trained to de- 
ceive and be deceived ; to accept shadows for substan- 
ces ; and to live a life of insincerity, and consequent dis- 
content and m.isery. 

" And still less are they to be exclusively submitted to 
the professional expounders and defenders of the various 
opposing religious systems throughout the world ; be- 
tween whom and the heroes it will not be easy to decide 
which has produced the greatest misery to mankind ; for 
how many thousands of these are actively engaged in 
propagating the notions of phrenzy and the raving of 
minds disordered among mankind ; spreading abroad 
hatred of all who are educated contri^ry to their particu- 
lar notions; defacing and deforming the charms of crea- 
tion, by substituting terror and misery for the happiness 



il3S 

and hope wliich ought to cheer and delight life ; who seek 
to bind man in misery, in order to make them dependent 
on those who, however they affect to conceal the idea, in 
effect assert the doctrine, that through each of them alone 
is future happiness to be obtained. 

" Nor should it ever be lost sight of to inculcate this 
truth equally to the rich in order that they may not for- 
get themselves, and to the poor that they may not forget 
what is due to them by society ; that, as ail wealth owes 
its source, its supply, and its continuance of value to hu- 
man labour ; that without labour there would be neither 
subsistence, nor comfort, nor society itself; that men 
would be no better than savages in a soil uncultivated ; 
and that arts and sciences themstlves must be extinct, if 
the hand of labour did not support them, by providing 
those riches which produce the activity of commerce, and 
the circulation of health and prosperity in all nations. It 
should also be kept in mind, that the far greater part of 
the population of this and of every other country belong to 
or have risen from the labouring classes, and that by them 
the happiness and comforts of those who are independent 
of personal labour, not excluding the very highest, are 
essentially influenced ; this requires to be more particu- 
larly enforced, because it goes to resist a very pernicious 
practice in all families, rich and poor, that of depreciat- 
ing the industrious and labouring people as an inft^rior 
class of beings ; but this is particularly the case in fami- 
lies which keep servants, who are too generally permitted 
to form the character of children ; this is an evil which 
has deeper effects and more mischievous consequences 
than may be supposed by those who are not accustomed 
to trace effects back to their causes, with due attention in 
the progress of the mind from infancy to youth. It is 
indeed impossible that children in any situation can be 
correctly trained, unless those who surround them from 
infancy are previously well instructed ; mothers who 
nurse their own children, and watch their mind's growth, 
•<\rd always rewarded in the health and habits of them ; 
those who entrust them to nurses, independent of the in- 
sensibitity and loss of felicity to the mother, she must b^ 
fortunate who happens on a nurse of the necessary tem- 
per, and health, r.nd habits, adapted to give the first happv 

U ii 



234 

impressions to infancy ; and the value of good servants 
to those who have experienced the difference between 
good and bad, can be duly appreciated, and the effects 
Upon children easily estimated. 

*'■ Let any man of reflexion examine for himself these 
questions — Of what benefit is it to the moral good of men 
well or ill-informed, bat more particularly the latter, to 
engage their minds in the discussion of tenets, upon 
which the most learned cannot come to an agreement, 
but upon the disputes concerning which the greatest afflic- 
tions are produced ! — and what would be the effect on the 
happiness of mankind, if instead of disputing about me- 
taphysical subjects, the mass of society was taught to re- 
gard practical morality, and that divine sentiment which 
calls upon all men to do towards others, as they wish 
others to do towards them ? Would not society profit by 
this change of practice ? 

" The only certain criterion of truth is its agreement and 
cgnstant consistency with itself: it remains one and the 
same under every view and comparison of it which can 
be made ; while error cannot stand the test of such inves- 
tigation and comparison, because it ever leads to absurd 
conclusions. 

^ Those whose minds are equal to the subject will, ere 
this, have discovered that the principles in which man- 
kind have been hitherto instructed, and by w^hich they 
have been governed, will not bear the test of this crite- 
rion. Investigate and compare them : they betray ab- 
surdity^ folly, weakness ; hence the infinity of jarring opi- 
nions, dissentions, and miseries, which have hitherto ex- 
isted. 

" Had any one of the various opposing systems' which 
until this day have governed the world, and disunited 
man from man, been true, without any mixture of error 5 
that system very speedily after its public promulgation, 
would have pervaded society, and compelled all men to 
have acknowledged the truth. 

"The criterion, however, which has been stated, shews 
that they are all, without exception, in part inconsistent 
with the works of nature, that is, with the facts which 
the great Author of the Universe has established around 
*as» Those systems,, one and all, must therefore contaiiv 



235 

oome fundamental errors, and it ib an utter impossibility 
that man can btcume rational, or enjoy happiness which 
othtTvvise his nature is capable of attaining, until those 
errors shall have been exposed and annihilated. 

'* Kach of these systems contain some truth wilh much 
more of error ; hence it is that no one ot them has gain- 
^\^ed, or is likely to gain universal consent or adoption ; but 
continue to present such contradictions, and distractions, 
and disagreements, as the world has never before seen, 
and which are calculated to multiply, rather than decrease 
in number, since habits formed from the universal varia- 
tion of climate and situation, must have an influence on 
that which is not so explicit and definite as to be at once 
comprehensible to the senses— -which are the same in all 
the species. 

" The truth which the several systems possess, serves to 
cover and perpetuate the errors with which artifice has 
associated and connected them — but those errors are 
most obvious to all such as have not, from infancy, been 
taught to receive them ; and wherever they spread will be 
subject to the influence of other notions, which have been 
in existence antecedently to their being offered to atten- 
tion. 

" In proof of this, ask in succession those who arc es- 
teemed the most intelligent and enlightened of every sect 
and party, what is their opinion of every other sect 
and party throughout the world. Is it not evident that, 
without one exception, the answer of each will be, that 
they all contain errors so clearly in opposition to reason 
and equity, that he can feel only pity and deep commis- 
seration for the individuals whose minds have been thus 
perverted and rendered irrational ? And this reply they 
will make, unconscious that they themselves are of the 
number whom they commisserate. 

" The doctrines which have been taught to every known 
, sect, combined with the external circumstances, by which 
they have been surrounded, have been directly calculat- 
ed, and could not fail to produce the characters which 
have existed ; and the doctrines in which the inhabitants 
of the world are now instructed, ccm!>ined with external* 
circumstances by which they are surrounded, form the 
characters which at present per\'ades society, and must 



236 

contiiiue to do so, so long as the interests of sects conti- 
nue to be preferred to the good of the species ; and that 
there are classes of men who derive all their power, from 
the iaflaence which this pernicious spirit secures to 
them, at the expense of human happiness and the dis- 
tractions of the whale earth. 

" The doctrines which have been, and which are now 
taught throughout the world, must necessarily, I repeat 
it, create and perpetuate, and they do create and tend 
to perpetuate, a total want of charity among men. They 
disunite nations, they disunite states within themselves ; 
they have desolated whole regions, and extirpated na- 
tions ; they maintain a perpetual feud, wherever they ob- 
tain any predominance ; and they destroy happiness, and 
produce enmities, and hatreds, and afflictions in families ; 
they seperate neighbours, and cause thejinhahitants of the 
same tenement, each to consider the other in a state of 
abhorrence and execration ; they generate superstition, 
bigotry, hypocrisy, hatred, revenge, wars, and all their 
evil consequences. iFor it has been, and continues to be 
a fundamental principle in every seer or system hitherto 
taught, with exceptions more nominal than real ; — ^' That 
" man will possess merit and receive eternal reward by 
" believing the doctrines of that peculiar system, which 
" each several teacher entertains ; that whoever disbe- 
*' lieves them will be eternally punished for th'v^rTt^isbe- 
" li^^ — ^'"^'^^ ^^1 tho^e countless millions, Vv^ho throughout 
" all former time, have not been taught to believe those 
" tenets, known only to later ages or to modern times, 
" must be doomed to eternal misery.'' 

The liberal, benevolent, and intelligent reader will 
see in the antecedent " Contemplations," many pre- 
cious truths well worthy his most serious investigation, 
notwithstanding the desultory manner in which they arein- 
troduced ; but bigoted, supercilious, and prejudiced men, 
however learned and eloquent they may be, will see 
nothing but deformity therein, because their own carica- 
tures are exhibited in miniature. There are many great 
men in these Un'ted States, blessed with capacious and 
comprehensive minds, who I well know will with the most 
superficial glance, see the great importance of many of 
these simplified truths ; and may I not humbly hope they 
will improve, enlarge, and illustrate the same, and re-ex- 



^37 

hibit them to the inspection of their fellow citizens. They 
well know, that those who have the ability, opportunity, 
and power to do good and remove evil, and do it not. to 
them it is sin. With distinguished deference, 1 will 
take the liberty to apply the above notification to every 
liberal, benevolent, and intelligent person, to whom this 
work may happily be presented, but particularly Mr. 
Monroe, our present President of the United States ; 
Mr. Jefferson, late President ; Dr. Logan, late Senator ; 
and Gen. Jackson, the patriotic defender of his country's 
rights and liberties. I mention the names of these illus- 
trious characters, as I know many of these truths re-exhi- 
bited by them, would have double weight with thtir compa- 
triots, and as I expect they will put some of our theories in 
practice. These men^ appear to me like the works of na- 
ture at once simple and sublime ! And what makes them 
appear so amiable and estimable in my sight, is the great 
contrast I see between them and many of their subordi- 
nate officers, I may add, subalterns, who, when clothed 
with a little brief authority, too often display to popular 
animadversion and contempt, their foolish pride and want 
of common sense. A vain coxcomb arrayed in military 
blue and scarlet, fringed with flowers of gold, appears to 
me like a jack-ass, ornamented with the tinsel and trap- 
pings of royalty. Such contemptible vanity, the ^ntipode 
of virtue, is beautifully displayed by Pope : — 

" Honour and shame, from no condition rise ; 
Act well your part : there all the honour lies. 



* The above eulogium I think is just; at any rale, I know it is disinterested 
on my pr.rt, as I uevcT reccivedjneither solicit nor expect any favour froitiany 
man in cMiirch or state. lama partizan to neither, "PnixciPLKS, not 
MF.N," IS my motto. Indeed there are too many greedy, is^norant, vociferous, 
unpi-incipled ofiice-hunters already in the United States, who begin to cor- 
rujjt our elections, and disliouour our national and slate councils, while emi- 
nent talents, and modest merit, blush unseen and unnoticed in the shades of 
«I i-uriiy. Such selfish and ambitions isrnoramus's, have always been the 
.prinKM-y cause of the annihilation of all ancient and modern repid)lics. Am 
1 not, t'lcrefore, correct in recommending my compatriots, to us»" alMawful 
ni'ansj to guard with wntchful care, the s;«cred palladium of their liberty and 
indepentlence. BEHOI.I) a Prince Hegent recently spending, for one sin- 
gle superb eTitcrtainmcpt, ^10,000 of the poor deJu 'ed peojile's money ; 
'.vliile they themselves are driven to the b» if ik of individual starvation anfl na- 
iinii;d liankrupicv, hv Ki v';.riiAKT ! and its auxiliary Friest-ciiaft ! ! ! I 
sav BEHOLD aiid BEWARE 



238 

Fortune in men has some small diff'rence made ; 
One flaunts in rags ; one flutters in brocade ; 
The cobler apron'd, and the parson gownM ; 
The friar hooded, and the monarch crown'd. 
' What differ more (you cry) than crown and cowl ?' 

i'll tell you, friend ! A wise man and a fool, 
''ou'll find, if once the wise man acts the monk ; 
Or, cobler like, the parson will be drunk ; 
Worth makes the man, and want of it the. fellow ; 
The rest is all but leather or prunella. 
Stuck o'er with titles, and hung round with strings, 
That thou may'st be by kings, or whores of kings. 
Boast the pure blood of an illustrious race 
In quiet flow from Lucrece to Lucrece : 
But by your father's worth if your'syou rate, 
Count me those only, who were good and^reat. 
Go ! if your ancient, but ignoble blood, 
Has crept through scoundrels ever since the flood : 
Go ! and pretend your family is young ; 
Nor own, your fathers have been fools so long. 
What can ennoble sots, or slaves, or cowards ? 
Alas ! not all the blood of all the Howards." 

Such feminine affectation is surely one among many of 
the deleterious fruits of a faulty and a futile education. 
Was my power equal to Mr. Monroe's, such vices, as well 
as those of monarchy and episcopacy, should be exhibited, 
in order to be execrated by our youth, not only in books 
and on monumental stones, but also in school rooms and 
places of public resort and amusement through the 
United States, while the opposite virtues should be incul- 
cated and enforced in golden capitals;. O ! may he be in 
magnitude to these rising states, what Lycurgus was ia 
miniature to Sparta. 

Though the American population are the most enlighten- 
ed, that is or ever was in the world, yet it is self-evident to 
those who can see the cause, as well the eirects of our moral 
corruptions, (a glimpse of which is only given in the ante- 
cedent pages,) that we need a patriotic and an enlightened 
reformcFj almost as much as the people of Sparta. 

FINIS, 



i23y 



EXPLANATION OF THE FRONTISPIECE. 



AS the phenomena of water spovits display, in a dis- 
thiguished manner, the " beauties and benefits of nature," 
which will appear obvious to every one who appreciate 
the great utility of rain : 1 have, therefore, exhibited one 
in our frontispiece, as seen off the river of Cape Fear; and 
I will beg leave to illucidate the same by the following 
description of water-spouts, in general, from my "Intel- 
lectual Telescope, page 91 : 

*' Eddies, or whirlpools, arc produced in the air, by its 
contrary currents ; these easily whisk up light bodies, as 
dust, hay, or straw ; in the deserts of Africa and Arabia 
they sometimes whirl up a body of sand, and bury alive 
whole caravans of travellers ; upon land they also seem 
to roll together the clouds, and condense them one 
upon another, darting down a syphon or spout, even tear- 
ing up trees, and pouring down a sudden inundation of 
waters. At sea it is, perhaps, these whirlwinds alone that 
produce the water-spout, so dreadful to mariners, and so 
astonishing to the observers of nature. This curious 
phenomenon is common in the tropical seas, and some- 
times it is seen in our own ; in the spot whence it ascends 
the water is observed to be agitated, and to rise above its 
level, with a froth or mist about ; the mist is then whirl- 
ed about with amazing rapidity, and ascends to the clouds 
in a column or canal, as thick as a man's finger, his arm, 
or sometimes his whole body ; when it has reached the 
cloud, which hangs over it, it spreads out like the mouth 
of a trumpet, and mixes with it, or perhaps it sometimes 
in this way it altogether produces the cloud of itself : the 
canal, or spout, in its ascent, sometimes rises perpendicu- 
larly, at others obliquely ; sometimes it is bent, some- 
times it is broken, and will join together again ; if the 
cloud be carried along, the canal follows it ; all which 
seems to shew, that it is entirely under the influence of 
the whirlwind, and produced by it alone. They are 



;40 



sometimes observed in a calm weather, but we know not 
hoVv the winds may be raging in the upper regions of the 
air ; whirlwinds are quite local tempests, and sometimes 
their force is confined to a very little space. These water- 
spouts last for several minutes, the canal then lessens by 
degrees till it vanishes, and the sea about it resumes its 
I ivei. If one of these fall upon a vessel, its waters are 
sufncitnt to break down its rigging, or sink it in the deep; 
it is said, however, that ships of any force usually fire 
their guns at them, loaded with a bar of iron ; and if so 
. ppy as to strike them, the water is instantly seen to fall 
from them, with a dreadful noise, though without any 
further mischief." 




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